



•^' i: 








*^o«' 







^"-^^^ 



V-^^ 






-^j.^^ 















\ %^ ^^ 











^ ^^^'^<, 




























v.*** 



♦1 /»**,* V "^ 



^^^^<^ 






.r-^. 









DAYS AND HOURS IN A 
GARDEN. 



DAYS AND HOURS IN 
A GARDEN. 



BY 

"E. V. B.' 



God Almighty first planted a garden, — 

And indeed it is the purest of human pleasures." 

Bacon. 



BOSTON : 

ROBERTS BROTHERS. 

1884. 



TO 

RICHARD CAVENDISH BOYLE, 

WHOSE LOVfi FOR NATURE, AND FOR ART, 

YEARS HAVE NOT CHILLED 

NOR TROUBLE CHANGED, 

THESE RECORDS OF OUR GARDEN 

ARE OFFERED BY 

E. V. B. 



GiFT 
ESTATE OF 




PREFACE 



THE pages that follow were published 
in a different form, during the past 
twelve months, in the Gardener's Chronicle. 
Their acceptance by many, as they appeared 
month by month, induced their republication 
under a new title, revised and re-edited. The 
writer desires gratefully to acknowledge the 
great help given by the Editor of the G^«r</g«^;'' J 
Chronicle, in the patient care with which 
he has named correctly almost every plant 
mentioned, whose common English designa- 
tion alone appeared in the original papers. 
To the pleasant '' Year in a Lancashire Gar- 



viii PREFACE. 



den," the suggestion is due of thus recording 
the triumphs and disappointments of another 
garden growing in a more genial climate ; 
a suggestion, the working out of which has 
proved to the writer a source of unlooked- 
for solace and refreshment. 

It may be added that the little drawings, 
as head and tailpieces, were afterthoughts, 
and were imagined and completed at some 
inconvenience and at a very short notice. 

E. V. B. 

October, 1883. 




OCTOBER. 



Fas est hie, Indulgere Genio. 




I. 

OCTOBER 17, 1882. 

Of Nuns and White Owls ; Yews, Thrushes, and Nut- 
crackers. 

THE GARDEN'S STORY. It is only 
eleven years old, though the place 
itself is an old place — an old place without 
a histor)% for scarce a record remains of 
it anywhere that we have ever found. Its 
name occurs on a headstone in the parish 
churchyard, and on one or two monuments 
within the chancel of the parish church. 
There is brief mention of it in Evelyn's 
Diary. It is there described, as " a very 
pretty seate in the forest, on a flat, with 
gardens exquisitely kept, tho' large, and the 
house, a staunch good old building." It 
seems George Evelyn (the author's cousin), 
was amongst the many who have lived here 
once. At that time eighty acres of wood 



DAYS AND HOURS 



surrounded the house, where now there lies 
a treeless stretch of flat cornfields. Quite 
near, across the road, are the ruins of an 
ancient nunnery. Our meadow under the 
high convent wall is called the Walk IMea- 
dow, because here the nuns used to walk. 
The great Walnut tree, which they might 
possibly have known, only died after we 
came. It was cut down for firewood, and 
its hollows were full of big chestnut-coloured 
" rat bats," very fierce and strong. At that 
time also white owls lived in the ruins, 
and used to come floating over the lawn at 
twilight — until the days of gun licenses, 
since when, they have disappeared. Dim 
legends surround the place, but nothing 
clear or certain is known or even said, and 
there is not a ghost anywhere. All we know 
is, that since taking possession, wherever a 
hole is dug in the garden to plant a tree, the 
spade is sure to strike against some old 
brick foundation of such firm construction 
that they have to use the pick to break it up. 
Bones of large dogs also are found all about 
the place whenever the ground is broken, — 
remains of the watch dogs, or hunting dogs, 



IN A GARDEN. 



of the olden time, — also quaintly-shaped 
tobacco-pipes. I know of nothing to sup- 
port the tradition that monks abode here 
once. There were signs of an upstairs room 
having at some remote time been used as a 
chapel ; a piscina in the wall, and a narrow 
lancet window having been found and 
destroyed, when the house was in the 
builder's hands eleven years ago. Broken 
arches, also, and mouldings in chalk and 
stone, were dug up out of the foundations of 
some outhouses at the same time. " They 
say" there is an underground passage be- 
tween the Abbey and the house, but we do 
not believe it, and we do not believe in the 
murder of a monk by a nun for his money, 
said to have been committed in the room 
which is now our best spare room. Such 
vague traditions are sure to hang around 
old walls, like mists about a damp meadow. 
Very distinct, however, and carved in no 
vague characters, are certain initials and 
dates still visible on the stems of the trees in 
the Lime avenue. For in old times, 

" Fond lovers, cruel as their flame. 

Cut in these trees their mistress' name." 



DAYS AND HOURS 



When the trees are bare and the western sky 
is bright, you can see them quite plainly — 
large capital letters, often a pair, enclosed in 
a large heart with the date. The dates run 
from 1668 on to late in 1700. Those old 
village lovers must have had sharp pen-knives, 
which cut deep ! They and their names have 
long passed away and been forgotten ; but, 
for so much as is traced in the living bark, 
these Limes have proved as good as any 
marble monument ; much better than the 
long wooden grave-boards which are still 
in fashion hereabouts. Since the place was 
ours this short avenue of twenty-four trees 
has been taken in from the public road ; and 
now the Limes give us cool shade and fra- 
grance and many midges in the hot summer 
days. I fear there is nothing more to be 
discovered about the past history of the 
House, than we now already know. We 
must be content ; and follow as we best 
may, George Herbert's concise admonition : 



"When you chance for to find, 
An old house to your mind, 
Be good to the poor, 
As God gives you store." 



AV A GARDEN. 



We have had the great pleasure of making 
the garden. The feature of the place was, 
and is, two symmetrically planted groups of 
magnificent Elms in the park field, in which 
every season we hope the rooks will build. 
There was everything to be done in the 
garden, to which these Elms form a back- 
ground. We found hardly any flowers; a 
large square lawn laid out in beds, with un- 
satisfactory turf and shrubberies beyond, a 
long, broad terrace walk, old brick walls, 
with stone balls on the corners, two or three 
old wrought iron gates in the wrong places, 
dabs of kitchen garden and potato plots, 
stable-yard and carriage entrance occupying 
the whole south front, with a few pleasant 
trees, a yoang Wellingtonia, a Stone Pine, a 
Venetian Sumach {Rhus cotimis), and a very 
large red Chestnut (from a seed brought from 
Spain in the waistcoat pocket of one of our 
predecessors here, fifty years ago, and said 
to be the first of the kind raised in England). 
Such was our new playground in 1871. 
Here we brought a skilful Gardener, possessed 
of common sense and uncommon good taste 
—can one say much more in a few words ? 



8 DAYS AND HOURS 

— and aided by our own most unscientific 
but exceeding love for flowers and gardening, 
we set to work at once. These " gardens on 
a flat " are transformed. 

There now are close-trimmed Yew hedges, 
some of those first planted being 8 feet 6 
inches high, and nearly 3 feet through, while 
others are kept low and square. There are 
Yews cut in pyramids and buttresses against 
the walls, and Yews in every stage of natural 
growth. I love the English Yew, with its 
" thousand years of gloom ! " (an age that 
ours, however, have not yet attained). The 
Wellingtonia, planted in 1866, has shot up to 
over forty feet high, and far outgrown its 
youthful Jack-in-the-Green look. The Stone 
Pine, alas ! has split in two, and been propped 
up ; and although half killed since by frost, it 
yet bears a yearly harvest of fine cones, chiefly 
collected for use as fire revivers ; — though 
the seeds ripen for sowing, or eating. The 
borders are filled with the dearest old- 
fashioned plants ; the main entrance is re- 
moved to the north side ; the stable-yard 
is removed also, and instead thereof are turf 
and straight walks, and a sun dial, and a 



IN A GARDEN. 



parterr for bedding-out things — the sole 
plot allowed here for Scarlet Pelargoniums 
and the like. In this parterr occurs the only 
foliage plant we tolerate — a deep crimson 
velvet-leaved Coleus. The centre bed is a 
raised square of yellow Stonecrop, and little 
white Harebells ; with an old stone pedestal, 
found in a stonemason's yard, bearing a leaden 
inscription — " to Deborah " — surmounted 
by a ball, on which the white pigeons 
picturesquely perch. There are green walks 
between Yew hedges and flower borders, 
Beech hedges, and a long green tunnel — the 
allee verie — so named in remembrance of a 
bower- walk in an old family place, no longer 
in existence. There are nooks and corners, 
and a grand, well- shaded tennis lawn, and 
crov>^n of all, there is the *' Fantaisie " ! This 
is a tiny plantation in the field, — I mean the 
Park, — date 1874, connected with the garden 
by a turf walk, with a breadth of flowers and 
young evergreen trees intermixed, on either 
hand. Here all my most favourite flowers 
grow in wild profusion. The turf walk is 
lost, after a break of Golden Yew, in a little 
wood — a few paces round — just large enough 



lO DAYS AND HOURS 

for the birds to build in, and with room for 
half-a-dozen wild Hyacinths and a dozen 
Primroses under the trees ; with moss, Wood 
Sorrel, and white and puce coloured Peri- 
winkles, and many a wild thing, meant to 
encourage the delusion of a savage wild ! I 
am afraid I never can be quite serious about 
a garden ; I always am inclined to find 
delight in fancies, and reminiscences of a 
child's garden, and the desire to get every- 
thing into it if I could. This '' Fantaisie " 
was a dream of delight during the past 
summer — from April, when a nightingale 
possessed in song the half-hidden entrance 
under low embowering Elm branches and 
Syringa — through all the fairy days and 
months, up to quite lately. Yes, even last 
week, it was fragrant with Mignonette and 
Ragged Jack (I mean that Alpine Pink 
Dianthus Plumarius), gay with yellow Zin- 
nias and blue Salvia in rich luxuriance, with 
a host of smaller, less showy things — with 
bunches of crimson Roses, and pink La 
France, blooming out from a perfect mist 
of white and pinkish Japan Anemones, white 
Sweet Peas, and a few broad Sunflowers 



IN A GARDEN. II 

towering at the back — their great stems 
coruscating all over with stars of gold ; and 
here and there clusters of purple clematis, 
leaning sadly down from a faggot of brown 
leaves and dead, wiry stalks, — or turning 
from their weak embrace of some red-brown 
Cryptomeria elegans. Even last week the 
borders throughout the garden looked filled 
and cheerful — brilliant with scarlet Lobelia 
and tall deep red Phloxes, and bushes of 
blue-leaved starry Marguerites, and the three 
varieties of Japan Anemone, with strange 
orange Tigridias and auratum Lilies and 
Ladies' Pincushion {Scabious, the *' Sau- 
dades" of the Portuguese language of 
Flowers), and every kind of late as well as 
summer Roses, the evening Primrose 
{CEnothera) making sunshine in each shady 
spot, with here and there the burning flame 
of a Tritoma ; though these last have not 
done well this autumn. 

Out near the carriage drive are Golden 
Rod and crimsoned patches of Azalea, and a 
second blow of late and self-sown Himalayan 
(so called) Poppies. In one narro\y bit 
of south border one finds that pretty blue 



12 DAYS AND HOURS 

daisy {Kaulfiissia Amelloides) — such an odd, 
pretty little thing. I remember a bed of it 
in the garden of my childhood, and I possess 
a portrait of it, done for me by my mother ; 
and then, never met with it again till a year 
or two ago, when unexpectedly it looked up 
at me, somewhere in a remote country 
churchyard. I am afraid our present stock 
comes from that very plant. Until now, the 
long border of many-coloured Verbenas was 
still rather gay, and the three east gables of 
the house were all aflame with Virginian 
Creeper. But two days of rain spoilt us 
entirely. The variegated Maple slipped its 
white garment all at once in the night, 
causing a melancholy gap. In the kitchen 
garden a bright red Rose or two remains, 
but along the east border the half-blown 
buds are rotted away. In the centre of one 
drenched pink bloom I saw a poor drone, 
drowned as he sat idly there. Small black- 
headed titmice are jerking about among the 
tallest Rose trees, insect hunting ; and still 
tinier wrens flit here and there bent on the 
same quest. Great spotted missel thrushes 
are now haunting the pillar Yews, beginning 



IN A GARDEN. 1 3 

to taste the luscious banquet just ready for 
them. While thus perched amongst the 
sweet scarlet Yew berries and dark foliage, 
the thrushes always bring to one's mind a 
design in old tapestry. 

And this reminds me of the good and 
abundant fruit-feast we have ourselves en- 
joyed this season. Strawberries and Rasp- 
berries were not much, but such Gooseberries, 
Apricots, and Nectarines! Peaches, plenty 
enough, but no flavour. Figs, enough 
to satisfy even our greediness,- — though v/e 
have but one tree, on a west wall. Pears, 
especially Louise Bonne, first-rate and 
plenty. Apples, a small crop, but sufficient. 
Wood Strawberries have been ripening under 
the windovvs till within the last few days : I 
planted them there for the sake of the 
delicious smell of the leaves when decaying 
— a smell said to be perceptible only to the 
happy few. Nuts (Filberts and Kentish 
Cobs) were plentiful, but we were only 
allowed a very few dishes of them. A large 
number of nuthatches settled in the garden 
as soon as the nuts were ripe ; they nipped 
them oif, and, carrying them to the old 



14 DAYS AND HOURS 

Acacia tree, which stands conveniently near, 
stuck them in the rough bark and cracked 
them at their ease (or rather punched holes 
in them). The Acacia's trunk at one time 
quite bristled over with the empty nut- 
shells, while the husks lay at the roots. The 
fun of watching these busy thieves at work 
more than made up for the loss of nuts. 
We had a great abundance of large green 
and yellow wall Plums, also a fair quantity 
of purple. Of sweet Cherries, unless 
gathered rather unripe, my dear blackbirds 
and starlings never leave us many. But 
there were a good lot of Morellos ; they 
don't care a bit for them. Whilst on the 
subject of fruit, let me say that never a 
shot is fired in the garden, unless to destroy 
weazels. Our "garden's sacred round" is 
free to every bird that flies — the delight of 
seeing them, and of hearing their music, 
compensates to the full any ravages they may 
indulge in. Thanks to netting without stint, 
and our Gardener's incomparable patience 
and longsuff"ering, I enjoy the garden and 
my birds in peace ; and if they ever do any 
harm, we never know it ; fruit and srreen 



IN A GARDEN. 15 



Peas never fail us ! . . . Here is a sunny 
morning ; and the cows are whisking their 
tails under the Elms, as if it were July. 
But indeed the last lingering trace of sum- 
mer has vanished : the garden is in ruins, 
and already the redbreast is singing songs 
of triumph. 




NOVEMBER, 



"The True Pleasure of a Garden." 

Bacon. 




II. 



NOVEMBER, 1882. 

Of Blossoms, Buds, and Bowers — Of May and June 
and July Flowers. 

November 3. — The ruin is complete ! and 
cleared away, too. . . . Yet there is consola- 
tion, and something very comfortable, in the 
neatness of the dug borders, and the beds 
made up for the winter. 

The symmetrically banked-up Celery — 
crested with the richest green, in the 
kitchen garden — rather takes my fancy : so 
also does the fine bit of colour in some huge 
heaps of dead leaves, that I see already 
stored in the rubbish yard. The dead 
leaves have to be swept away from lawn and 
garden walks — but I believe we do not con- 



20 DAYS AND HOURS 



sider any except those of Beech and Oak to 
be of much service. It is my heresy, that 
leaves do not fall till the goodness of them 
has decayed. They are of use, however, when 
left to cover the ground a,bove tender roots. 
In the Fantaisie the earthy bed can scarce 
be seen, so close lies this warm counterpane 
of leaves ! The great Elms, on the greyest 
days, now make sunshine of their own. 
Their lofty breadths of yellow gold, tower 
above the zone of garden trees. When the 
sun illumines them, and the light winds pass, 
it is a dream to watch the glittering fall of 
autumn leaves. The ancient times return, 
and Jove once more showers gold around 
some sleeping Danae ! During the first days 
of the month, the parterr was done. Tulips 
put in, and a lot of Crocuses in double row. 
In a few beds the dwarf evergreens, which 
had been removed for the summer, are 
planted in again — ^just to make the parterr' s 
emptiness look less cheerless from the 
dining-room windows. Between these small 
evergreen bushes,, in their season, will come 
up spikes of Hyacinths of varied hue. I 
do not care for a whole bed of Hyacinths 



IN A GARDEN. 21 



or Tulips ; they give me little real pleasure 
unless the colours be mixed. One chief 
charm of a garden, I think, depends on 
surprise. There is a kind of dulness in 
Tulips and Hyacinths, sorted, and coming 
up all one size and colour. I love to watch 
the close-folded Tulip bud, rising higher 
and higher daily — almost hourly — from its 
brown bed ; and never to be quite certain 
of the colour that is to be, till one morning 
I find the rose, or golden, or ruby cup in 
all its finished beauty; perhaps not at all 
what was expected ! And then, amid these 
splendours, will suddenly appear one shorter 
or taller than the rest, of the purest, rarest, 
white. How that white Tulip, coming as it 
were by chance, is valued ! And so, again 
this year a mixed lot are planted. There 
was a time when we had only one Tulip in 
all the garden. I used to look for it regu- 
larly i n a certain shady border under a 
Laburnum tree ; an old-fashioned, dull, 
purple and white-striped flower, but it never 
failed to show, at the very end of every 
season. I had a regard for that Tulip, and 
last summer it was a disappointment vainly 



22 DAYS AND HOURS 

to wait for its appearance in the accustomed 
spot. Many there were of its kind, surpass- 
ing it in loveliness ; but then they were not 
the same. 

Hyacinth beds will be a new thing here, 
but I doubt if they will make us quite 
so happy as has hitherto, the unexpected 
advent of some stray pyramid of small 
odorous bells, pink, blue, or creamy-white, 
in out-of-the way places about the garden. 
After their flowering is over the pot-bulbs 
are always turned out somewhere in the 
borders. When a plant has lived with us 
for a time under the same roof, or even in 
the green-house, giving out for us its whole 
self of sweetness or of beauty, it seems so 
cruel that it should at last be thrown away 
as if worthless and forgotten ! Some Nar- 
cissus that have had their day, have just 
been put into a round bed on the further 
lawn mixed with the ''Mrs. Sinkins " white 
Pink ; and there is a rim all round of double 
lilac Primroses. I have long wished to have 
plenty of that dear old neglected Primrose ; — 
so now we have a number of healthy roots 
from an old garden in Derbyshire. In the 



IN A GARDEN. 23 

centre of this bed is a very tall dead Cupres- 
sus, one of our few failures in transplantation 
last spring. A Cobaea, which was to have 
grown up quick and made a " bonnie green 
gown " for the poor bare tree, proved failure 
number two. It absolutely refused to grow, 
or do anything but look stunted and miser- 
able, till one day, late in October, there it 
was running up the tree as fast as possible, 
clothing every twig with leaves and tendrils, 
and large, deep, bell-like blossoms ! Its day 
must be short, however, at the wrong end of 
the year, and even now its bells are chilled 
to a greenish hue. A fine red climbing 
Rose on one side, and one of the old Blairii, 
on the other, will make a kinder and more 
beautiful summer garment. 

We have made a new Lavender border, 
and now I hope to have enough for the bees, 
and afterwards enough, when dried, to lay 
within the drawers and wardrobes, and give 
us " all the perfume of summer, when 
summer is gone " ; enough, too, for pot- 
pourri, though we do not always make this 
fresh each year. It takes time, and there is 
so little time in these days ! and often the 



24 DAYS AND HOURS 

Roses are too wet, and the Lavender too 
scarce. The recipe we use is an old one : 
the paper is yellow, and the ink faded. But 
our best pot-pourri of these days, comes not 
near the undying fragrance of some Rose 
leaves, — three generations old — that we 
still preserve in one or two old covered jars 
and bowls of Oriental porcelain. Along the 
south wall, an oblong bed is planted with 
dark purple heartsease, and two more with 
yellow. There are six beds, and in the 
spring they will glow resplendently with 
a setting of crocuses, white, yellow, and 
lilac ; meanwhile a good layer of cocoa- 
nut fibre gives a look of comfort for the 
winter; and moreover, rather annoys the 
field-mice. 

Under the Holly hedge, facing south, a 
narrow border has been made ready to 
receive a quantity of white Iris roots. The 
Holly hedge, planted for shelter and for 
pleasure, along a broad walk on one side of 
the carriage drive, is not in itself a success 
as yet. It was put in four years ago, but 
the trees were too old, I think ; this year it 
is flushed all over with scarlet berries. 



IN A GARDEN. 2$ 

I am sorry to have to remove m}' beloved 
white Irises, but they have increased so 
enormously as to make some change 
necessary. Nearly twenty years ago I 
carried home from the south of France a 
few small roots in a green pitcher. For 
half that time they grew and multiplied 
on the sunny terraces of a sweet Somerset- 
shire garden, and now for ten other years 
the same roots, transplanted here, have 
flourished, if possible, still more abundantly. 
It may be fancy only, but I think our white 
Irises might not have succeeded as they 
do, had they not been loved so well. Every- 
body has a favourite flower, I suppose — 
the white Iris is mine — the Fleur-de-lys 
of France — the lily of Florence. Nothing 
can be more refined and lovely than the thin, 
translucent petals. To see these flowers at 
their best, one must get up and go into the 
garden at five o'clock on some fine morning 
at the end of May. I did it once, and as I 
walked beside their shining rows in the 
clear daylight, I felt there were no such 
pearly shadows nor any such strange purity 
in the whiteness of other flowers. We have 



26 DAYS AND HOURS 

given away a great many, but I fear I am not 
altogether sorry that they do not seem always 
to succeed elsewhere as they do with us. I 
am trying to collect every different Iris I 
know of. We have now several which are 
very beautiful, and we should have more 
were it not that numbers die off after, 
perhaps, one short summer's loveliness. 
They dwindle and become sickly, and then 
altogether disappear. Almost our whole 
stock of one well-established kind — an old 
inhabitant of the garden — was destroyed by 
mice two seasons ago. The flower is bronze- 
brown, with a golden blaze in the middle. 
La Marquise (Iris Lurida ?), an old-fashiOned 
dove-coloured sort, with purple frays on 
the falls — will grow anywhere. So will the 
large, broad-leaved, pale lilac kind, and the 
yellow Algerian. A little black wild Iris, 
that fringes the vineyard trenches about 
Florence, we have either lost, or it will not 
flower. They call it there "La Vedova." 
I brought home some roots once from 
Bellosguardo, and we put them in where 
all the warmest rays of the south sun 
would find them. But only the long narrow. 



IN A GARDEN. 27 



wild onion-like leaves appear — or, I fancy, 
they are the Vedova's leaves. Still I do not 
lose hope, but watch for it always when 
March comes round ; — and some day, some- 
where, I think, my little "widow" is sure 
to surprise me ! The wild yellow Italian 
Tulip, that came with the Iris, succeeds here 
well. The patch of pale gold never fails, by 
the first week in April, to enliven the sunny 
side of a Yew hedge. A few untidy yellow 
blooms, supported on slender limp stalks, 
live there, just the same as in their own 
dear Italy. I stoop down to gather one, and 
for a moment the English garden is not 
there. . . . Before me lies a grassy vineyard 
path — there are the great open farm-sheds 
full of sunlight and sunlit shade — and the 
pair of grey long-horned oxen, calmly 
waiting for the yoke. Near them, with her 
knitting, stands a patient sad-eyed woman, 
while happy children run down the path at 
play, or tie up bunches of yellow tulips 
under the fig-trees. . . . Then there is a tall, 
white flag Iris, whose place is not yet fairly 
fixed. It is a handsome thing, and quite 
unlike the Fleur-de-lys. I think of mixing 



DAYS AND HOURS 



it in with the yellow Flags and Osmunda 
regalis beside the little watercourse. Last 
July, to watch the slow blooming of some 
Japanese Iris in the kitchen garden gave 
me intense delight. They grew tall and 
straight, with curiously ribbed leaves. The 
single flower at the top of each stem opened 
out very flat with rounded petals, rich 
purple in colour, and measuring nearly 
seven inches across. One saw at once it 
was the purple flower the Prince, in the 
German fairy tale, found on the mountains, 
and carried ofl" to disenchant his love with, 
in the old witch's cottage by the wood — only 
a large pearl lay in the centre of that flower. 
(There is no such thing as anachronism in 
fairy tales!) 

We have gathered in our harvest of 
winter decorations for the hall and corridors. 
There is Pampas-grass with its silken plumes, 
and soft tassels of all kinds of downy German 
grasses, and everlastings of all lovely shades 
of orange and red. They have hung in 
bunches head downwards in the vinery to 
dry for weeks past, and they will last for 
the next twelve months as fresh as they are 



IN A GARDEN. 



29 



now. I have been told of a great bouquet 
of everlasting flowers, in a Dutch gentleman's 
drawing-room at the Cape, which was 
affirmed to be two hundred years old. We 
have sheaves of Honesty, also ; " Money in 
your Pocket," — as the poor say, — which are 
to gleam like flakes of mother-o'-pearl in 
the firelight of December's dusky afternoons. 
We left plenty in the garden, however, 
where they will stand a good deal more of 
rough weather before they fall to pieces. 
Honesty is always handsome in all stages of 
its growth ; and like the people who take 
things easily, it thrives everywhere. With 
us it is quite at home in a damp north 
border, close under a line of Elms. All 
through June and July, the violet glow of 
a mass of it in full bloom made a brilliant 
eff"ect ; and now in these November days, 
the ripe seed vessels are transformed — their 
outer husk has shelled off, leaving only the 
silvery centre. The other day, in my early 
walk, just where the AUee Verte ends (no 
longer green, it is now a golden corridor, 
with underfoot, crisp russet leaves), I seemed 
to come upon — not Wordsworth's host of 



30 DAYS AND HOURS 

dancing Daffodils, but a company of spirits ! 
The slanting sunbeams fell upon a clump of 
Honesty, and touched with fire every one of 
the myriad little silver moons. Though no 
wind stirred, they seemed to quiver with 
ghostly life in a shimmer of opal lights. 

Nov. 1 8. — Winter is striding on, and every 
bit of colour in the garden becomes more 
precious than ever. Only a few days ago 
I made a nosegay of crimson summer Roses, 
a fine auratum Lily, a Gladiolus, a Welsh 
Poppy, and a large red-rimmed annual 
Poppy, with a wonderful spray of flexuosa 
Honey-suckle, that filled the room with its 
fragrance. A little while since, in one 
sheltered corner, Salvia patens still held 
its own in unsullied blue. Marigolds were 
plenty; St. John's Wort must have made 
a mistake in its dates, for it was all over 
polished yellow buds ready to unclose ; 
Mignonette and a few Sweet Peas lingered 
still. Here and there one came upon a 
white Snap-dragon or a flash of rose-red 
Phlox ( " Farewell Summers " they call them 
in the West). It was impossible not to 



IN A GARDEN. 



31 



admire the vigour and beauty of Primroses 
and Polyanthus of every colour. One only 
hopes this abundant autumnal bloom may 
not interfere with their blossoming in the 
spring; it is certainly finer than I ever 
remember in former seasons. A rockwork 
of big flints was quite gay with Virginian 
Stock and Primroses. To-day the frost is 
most severe. The Marigolds look unlike 
themselves, with a white cap border of 
frost, quilled round their orange faces ; the 
half-opened buds in a Tea Rose bed are like 
fancy Moss Roses ; only the moss is white, 
and every leaf is fringed with little sharp- 
pointed crystals. The China Rose tree by 
the green door in the wall, is covered with 
pink roses, which I forgot to gather yesterday 
for my flower-glasses. This morning the 
frost has curiously changed them. The 
delicate petals are stiffened all through as if 
they were turned into wax models, though 
their lovely pink is not dimmed, and they 
smell as sweet as if nothing had happened. 
By this time our Irish Yews have resumed 
their wonted sadness. The berries are all 
carried off, and the blackbirds have fattened 



32 DAYS AND HOURS 



SO well on them, and on the bunches of grapes 
(left for their benefit on the house Vines), 
that they rise from the lawn quite heavily. I 
never saw such fat blackbirds ! The seed of 
the Yew berries, which is believed to be the 
only poisonous part, is, I think, in most 
cases, left unswallowed ; and in one little 
tree I found the remnants of an old nest filled 
with a compact mass of Yew seeds. The 
large blue titmouse carries off his berry to 
the Sumach tree, and there pecks off the 
pulp, holding it down with his foot. The 
larger thrushes are gone, I know not where ; 
only one small bird, with richly spotted 
breast, is still seen about the grass, under 
the Stone Pine. 

The Chrysanthemums in the greenhouse 
must have the last word. Nothing could be 
more beautiful than they are now, and have 
been for several weeks past. Some of the 
Japanese kinds are indescribably lovely ; 
arrayed in tints that make one think of a 
sea-shell, or the clouds about an April sun- 
rise. There is something perhaps in their 
delicious confusion of petals, that helps this 
wonderful effect of colour. The other sorts, 



IN A GARDEN. ^^ 

which are stiffer in arrangement, and more 
decided in colour, are to me somewhat 
less delightful. A tiny wren was among 
the Chrysanthemums this morning, noise- 
lessly flitting in and out, like a little shade ; 
evidently in a state of the highest enjoyment. 
No doubt I and the bird both took our 
pleasure with them, — in different ways ! 




DECEMBER, 



•' Once a Dream did Weave 
a Shade" . . . 



"He who goeth into his garden to look for spiders and cob- 
webs, will doubtless find them ; but he who goes out to seek a 
flower, may return to his house with one blooming in his bosom." 




III. 

DECEMBER. 

Of Spiders' Webs, Christmas Roses, King Arthur, 
and the Tree I Love. 

December 6. — Among the strange and beau- 
tiful sights of the garden during the hard 
hoar-frost that ushered in the first days of 
the month, not the least beautiful were the 
spiders' webs. Passing along the Larch 
Walk, the o?ik palings that divide us on that 
side from the ne^y road (the old road, made 
by Richard, King of the Romans in the thir- 
teenth century, is now within the grounds), 
were hung all over with white rags — or so it 
seemed at first sight. And then, just for one 
second, that curious momentary likeness of 
like to unlike chanced. I remembered the 
street of palaces at Genoa, the day when I saw 



n 



38 DAYS AND HOURS 

it last ; the grand old walls covered M'ith 
fluttering rags of advertisements — yes, ad- 
vertisements in English : '* Singer's Sewing 
Machine." The white rags on our palings 
were spiders' webs both new and old, a 
marvellous number, thus crystallized as it 
were into existence by the frost, where 
scarcely one had been before. In open 
weather the webs are as good as invisible to 
human eyes ; but now that frost had thickened 
the minutest threads to the size of Berlin 
wool — though in beauty of texture they 
resembled fine white velvet chenille — there 
was a sudden revelation of these wonderful 
works of Art ! One feels, if the nets show 
only half as large and thick to a fly's eye, 
the spider's trade must be a poor one. Here 
is a calculation that will probably interest 
nobody : 567 feet of pales over 5 feet high, 
and an average of 18 webs to every 9 feet. 
It may prove, however, something of the un- 
suspected multitude of spiders in a given 
area, though it is nothing to the acres of 
ploughed land, that the level sun-ray of an 
autumn afternoon will show completely 
netted over with gossamer. Making the 



IN A GARDEN. 39 



most of a few minutes' inspection — for I 
should myself have frozen had I watched 
much longer these frozen webs — I could 
see but two varieties of work — the cobweb 
which usurped the corners, and the beau- 
tiful wheel- within-wheel net. In them all 
one might observe once more that ever- 
recurring stern immutability, of the thing 
called Instinct. Here, for instance, are two 
sets of spiders living close neighbours for 
years together. Each set makes its snares on 
an opposite plan ; and although they cannot 
help seeing each other's work continually, 
neither takes the least hint from the other. 
The plain cobweb is never made more intri- 
cate ; the artist of the wheel never dreams 
that she might do her spinning to a simpler 
pattern. Happy people ! They trouble not 
their heads about improvements ; yet, on 
looking closer at the last-named webs, there 
seemed something of the faintest indication 
of a slight individuality; so far at least, that 
in a dozen nets there would be five or six, 
worked within a square of four lines, while 
the remxainder had five, tied rather carelessly 
in a knot below. Perhaps the variation 



40 DAYS AND HOURS 

marks two distinct species ; or it may be 
only accidental. Next day every visible 
trace of the strong beautiful webwork, I had 
so admired, was gone with the frost. The 
spider may have " spread her net abroad 
with cords " as usual, but there was no 
magician's wand to touch it. 

The orchard ought to be very gay in the 
spring. Daffodils have been dropped in all 
over the turf, and a round patch dug round 
each Apple tree, is to be filled with yellow 
Wallflowers. This is an experiment, and I 
do not feel sure that I shall like the flowers, 
so well as the trees simply growing out of 
the grass. A change, however, is always 
pleasant ; though perhaps, one might hardly 
care to lay out the garden differently every 
year, as the Chinese are said to do. I had a 
dream, of the orchard grass enamelled with 
many-coloured Crocuses — in loving remini- 
scence of certain flowery Olive grounds I 
know ; but after all, the imitation would have 
been as poor as a winter sky compared to 
the glowing blue of June. I am not without 
hope some day — that golden ''some day" 



IN A GARDEN. 4 1 

which so seldom comes — to naturalise in our 
orchards the real enamdling of the Olive 
groves — that often-used phrase is too hard in 
sound and in its usual meaning, to express 
the loveliness of those lilac star Anemones — 
with here and there a salmon-pink, or a fiery 
scarlet, blazing like a sun in the living green 
beneath the trees. I used to think nothing 
on this earth could come so near a vision of 
the star-strewn fields of Paradise. 

In the north, or entrance court, we have 
been busy transplanting some large Apple 
trees that had overgrown their place, and 
setting free the trimmed Yews between which 
they grew. The blackness of these formal, 
cut YewS; shows well against the old walls, 
which are covered with very aged Green 
Gages and golden Drops. On the turf be- 
tween each of the pyramid Yews, broad ob- 
long beds have been made ; in April we hope 
to plant them with pink China Roses, which 
are to grow very dwarf, and to flower the 
whole year through ! The border round the 
Roses may be blue Nemophila ; or perhaps 
the lovely Santolina fragrans, with the soft 
grey foliage. 



42 DAYS AND HOURS 

I think the " going in " to one's house 
should be as bright and cheerful as it is 
possible to make it. But how hard it is to 
brighten up a north aspect ! ours has hither- 
to been far too gloomy. In the garden, 
the bed of Roman Roses is warmly matted 
over for the winter. This brave little red 
China Rose is one of my great favourites ; 
it goes on flowering for ever ! Even now, 
when the matting is raised a little bit, I can 
see buds and leaves and the red of opening 
blooms. I call it the Roman Rose chiefly 
because it grows at Florence ; which is so 
very Irish, that I think there must have been 
some better reason now forgotten. The Rose 
hedges in the beautiful Boboli Gardens are 
crimsoned over with blossom as early as 
the end of March ; with us, however, it 
needs protection when planted in the open 
ground. 

Under the east wall is our only Christmas 
Rose ; it is a very large plant, and over it 
was built up about a month ago, a little 
green bower of Spruce Fir branches. The 
shelter is to save the blooms from frost, 
which so often tarnishes their whiteness 



IN A GARDEN. 43 



with red. Almost daily as I passed, I have 
peeped in to watch the cluster of white buds 
nestled snugly within. The buds have duly 
swelled and lifted one by one their heads, 
and now this morning our first bunch of 
perfect Christmas Roses has been gathered. 
This flower must, I think, be dear to every 
one with a heart for flowers. Its expression 
is so full of innocence and freshness — for it is 
not only human persons who have expression 
in their faces ! and then, the charm of its 
Myrtle-like stamens and clear cut petals — 
snow-cold to the touch — and its pretty way 
of half-hiding among the dark leaves — 
always ready to be found when sought — and 
ahvays with so many more blossoms than 
had been hoped for ! To some, indeed, the 
associations bound up with the Christmas 
Rose — with even the sound of its name — 
may be dearer than all its outward loveliness ; 
recalling perhaps, the house and garden of 
their childhood, and happy Christmases of 
long ago ; " the old familiar faces," and tones 
of the voices that are gone. I must here 
make the confession, that last year in my 
anxiety for the whitest possible of blossoms, 



44 



DAYS AND HOURS 



I had glass placed over the plant ; and in 
spite of warnings, put matting over that ; 
all which ended at Christmas in a fine show 
of green Roses ! In the pits there are several 
of the smaller kind coming on in pots, which 
will soon be ready to cut. These are easy 
enough in their ways. But the Christmas 
Rose out in the border, is a difficult thing to 
grow ; full of quirks and fancies, and like a 
woman, hard to please. Once, however, it 
settles down in any spot, it will thrive there ; 
and then will sooner die than take to a new 
place. 

Dec. 13. — Our second white frost has 
vanished, and the grass appears again with a 
moist and pleasant smell. The forest of the 
Fantaisie is thinned, and the encircling Lau- 
rels trimmed. The whole took just half a 
winter's day to do. At the end of the turf 
walk between the bushes and the golden 
Yews, peers out a Spindle tree, with its pink 
and scarlet fruit. The birds seem not to 
care for it, for the fruit is all there — un- 
touched. I wonder if the name of Spindle 
comes from the unnatural thinness of the 
tree ! 



IN A GARDEN. 45 

After these many years of working to a 
special end, we seem now to have ahnost 
reached it in one direction, for the garden 
looks well-nigh as green and furnished in 
winter as in summer — so far, at least, as the 
outline of verdure goes. The Yew hedges 
and Pines and perennial greens are at their 
best now, in mid -winter ; they would even 
seem to have grown and thickened out since 
the summer died away. Watching the 
growth of these trees and hedges has been 
the delight and solace of many a troubled 
time, and one cannot but feel the most affec- 
tionate interest in them. In the centre of 
a triangular-shaped bit of lawn, surrounded 
by Conifers, we have placed a large stone 
vase on a square stone pedestal. The vase 
is old and grey, and had long stood in 
another place where it made no show. The 
grey stone looks well against the warm 
greens that back it, and will look better 
when the season comes to fill it with bright 
summer flowers. The trees that stand 
around, all wear a sort of charmed double 
life — at least to me — silently, fancifully. 

It was at a time of sickness, that the sleep- 



46 DAYS AND HOURS 

less hours of the long winter nights came to 
be passed in spirit with the trees in the gar- 
den, and especially with half-a-dozen or so 
of our beautiful straight young Pines. Dare 
I tell the secret ? They all became knights 
and ladies of King Arthur's Court ! The great 
Wellingtonia standing a little apart, is Arthur 
himself. The Nordmanniana, with its whorls 
of deepest green and strong upward shoot of 
fifteen inches in the year, is Sir Launcelot. 
The gold-green softly feathered Douglas Fir, 
Sir Bedevere. The young Cedar of Lebanon, 
with fretted boughs of graceful downward 
sweep, Sir Agravaine. Sir Bors is a 
rounded solemn English Yew, of slow and 
steadfast growth. Sir Palomides, — a fine 
pillar-shaped Thuia, — towers between Sir 
Gawaine and Sir Gaheris, who are both clad 
in the wondrous green with almost metallic 
lustre, of CupressusLawsoniana erectaviridis. 
These all stand round the triangular lawn, 
and amongst them comes by some strange 
chance, St. Eulalie, a lovely Pine {Abies 
Amabilis), whose robe of grey-blue tufted 
foliage wraps her feet, and trails upon the 
grass. 



IN A GARDEN. 47 



Beyond, on the long lawn next **the 
park," stands Sir Tristram, the fine young 
Pinsapo ; he all but perished in the frost of 
1879-80, but now he seems to have drawn 
new strength and vigorous green, from that 
nearly fatal conflict with his terrible enemy. 
On the house lawn, the Deodara, is the fairy 
Morgan-le-faye. Near her stood Sir La 
Cote-mal-taille, an ill-formed Lawsoniana • 
but he is now transplanted elsewhere. King 
Mark is a rather wretched ill-grown Cedrus, 
in summer almost hidden by Laburnums. 
Dame Bragwaine is a curious Cryptomeria 
elegans ; she has so many names (seven, at 
least, that I know of), and she takes such odd 
diverse disguises ! once, loaded with heavy 
snow, she had to be supported by a stake, 
and took the semblance of a bear leaning on 
a ragged staff. In summer she is green, and 
in winter she wears a dress of purple brown ; 
in rain or heavy dew, she is spangled all 
over with diamonds and pearls. Queen 
Guinevere was never represented, no tree 
was found to fit her character. But near 
King Arthur and Sir Tristram, the two great 
Pampas tufts still waving wintry plumes, 



48 DAYS AND HOURS 

are ** La Beale Isoude " and *' Isoude les 
Blaunch Mains." 

From our foolish garden-dreaming let us 
rest, and turn with a long look of revering 
love to the great Oak, that stands in his 
strength out in the park field, beyond the 
garden. On three sides round are lines of 
guardian Elms, in all their pride of delicate 
leafless intricacy ; alone, amid the leafless 
ones rises the Oak, wearing still his crown 
of brown, sere leaves. Smooth and straight 
grows up the giant stem, full twenty feet to 
the spring of the lowest branch. Two brother 
Oaks stand on either side. Their form is 
more rounded, more perfect ; but high above 
them the great Oak uprears his head — 
unconcerned, and grandly branched, though 
shattered by every fierce west wind that 
blows. Every storm works some loss, but 
from the way each torn limb lies, you would 
say he had thrown it down in proud defiance. 
The wood-pigeons shelteramong the summer 
leaves ; the autumn ripens a rich store of 
acorns ; and now, as I survey him from the 
terrace walk, or gaze upwards from the wet 
dead leaves beneath, through all the mystery 



IN A GARDEN. 49 

of his bare and spreading boughs, I think 
of Keats' stanza — 

" In a drear-nighted December, 
Too happy, happy tree, 
Thy branches ne'er remember 
Their green felicity ; 
The north cannot undo them, 
With a sleety whistle through them, 
Nor frozen thawings glue them 
From budding at the prime." 

The Oak is to my mind the tree of trees ; 
and the destruction of its foliage, by insect 
ravages, that has year by year saddened so 
many parks and woods, has not come near us, 
I rejoice to say. Our few (there are but four or 
five) are safe as yet. I heard the gardener of 
one great place that had suffered much, ac- 
knowledge as the cause, the scarcity of birds. 




JANUARY, 1883. 



'*To the Attentive Eye, each Mo- 
ment of the Year has its own 
Beauty." 

Emerson. 




IV. 



JANUARY. 

Of Field-Mice, and the Thorn of Joseph of Arimathea — 
Of " Poor Johnnys "—A Lilac Gem— And Green- 
house Flowers. 



January 5, 1883. — A large body of the army 
of the small ones of the earth has attacked 
us, and it is no fault of theirs if we are not 
despoiled of the best of our spring delights. 
The field mice have at length found out the 
Crocuses ; we, on our side, have set traps 
in their way, and large numbers have fallen 
— quite flat, poor little things ! — under the 
heavy bricks. We believe we should have 
slain many more, had not some clever crea- 
ture made a practice of examining the traps 
during the night, devouring the cheese, and 



54 DAYS AND HOURS 

in some way withdrawing the bit of stick, 
so as to let the brick fall harmless. Sus- 
picion points towards one person especially 
— the old white fox-terrier, who lives in the 
stables, and is master (in his own opinion) 
of all that department, and whom neither 
gates nor bars can prevent going anywhere 
he chooses to go. — " Impossible ! " says he 
with Mirabeau, "don't mention that stupid 
word ! " Up to this time field-mice have not 
troubled us much. In the days when there 
was always a hawk or two hovering over 
the ploughed land, or keeping watch over the 
green meadows, and when we used to hear 
the owls in the summer nights, and saw 
the white owl who lived somewhere near 
by, sail silently in the grey of evening across 
the lawn — in those days we knew little of 
the plague of field-mice. But now we have 
changed all that ; cheap gun licences have 
put a gun into every one's hand, the vermin 
is ruthlessly shot, and the balance of Nature 
is destroyed. 

It is rather a fearful pleasure that we take 
just now to mark the unwonted earliness of 
green things of all kinds. One cannot help 



IN A GARDEN. 55 

dreading that some great check will happen 
later on in the year ; and yet it may be an 
omen for good, that the birds' full concert 
has only just begun, in these dark mornings 
amongst the trees of the garden. The say- 
ing goes in Scotland, ** If the birds pipe 
afore Christmas they'll greet after;" and 
so far as I know not a note was sung till 
December 30. The birds served our Hollies 
a good turn at Christmas. In November 
the Hollies were scarlet with berries, and 
one thought with a shudder of how they 
would have to suffer, when the time came 
for Christmas decorations ; then occurred 
two short severe frosts, and, to my joy, 
the Holly trees were swept clear of every- 
tempting spot of scarlet before Christmas, 
and thus were saved the customary reck- 
less breaking and tearing of branches. 
Dear birds ! Does any one ever think, I 
wonder, sitting in the summer shade near 
*' some moist, bird-haunted English lawn," 
how dull it would be without them } — how 
much they enhance for us the grace and 
charm of the garden and the country ? It 
is their gay light-heartedness that is so 



56 DAYS AND HOURS 

delightful, and that we should miss so much 
if they were not there. Who ever saw a 
grave bird ? — at least I mean a grave little 
one — the bigger the sadder it is, with them. 
Their very labours of nest-building, and of 
feeding their young ones, are done like a 
merry bit of child's play! The birds' never- 
failing interest in life, is like a sort of tonic 
to those who love them. Michelet felt this 
when he called them, *'Des etres innocents, 
dont le mouvement, les voix, et les jeux, 
sont comme le sourire de la Creation." 

I do not remember having seen before in 
mid-winter, a Hawthorn hedge bursting out 
into leaf! At the end of last month, how- 
ever, there were strong young shoots and 
fully formed leaves on some of the Quicks 
in a hedge planted last spring in our lane. 
I have known nothing like this, except the 
Glastonbury Thorn. There is one of these 
strange thorns, a large tree, growing just 
within the park gates of Marston Bigot, in 
Somersetshire. It used to bloom with great 
regularity in mild winters about this time. 
Tufts of flowers came all over the branches, 
smelling as sweet as Hawthorn in May. I 



/yV A GARDEN. 57 

have often cut a long spray all wreathed with 
pearly bloom, on New Year's Eve, in former 
years. The flowers come with scarce a sign 
of leaf about them, and they are rather 
smaller than those of the common May. 
The emerald green of turf thickly sprinkled 
with Daisies, seems also an unusual sight 
for January. The first green glow on the 
grass and the first Daisy, we are surely used 
to hail as signs of approaching spring. On 
the lawn, too, a yellow Buttercup, careless 
of the heavy roller has dared to hold up its 
head ! 

January 8. — The weather has been for many 
weeks so dark and gloomy, that the rare sun- 
shine which shone upon the land to-day was 
as welcome and nearly as unlooked for, as 
]\Iay flowers in January. The house stood 
blocked out in sun and shadow. Magnolia 
grandiflora which covers the south-east 
gable, looked grand in this flood of radiance. 
Standing before it, the refrain of a wild 
canzonetta I once heard, chanted forth lazily 
in the little sun-steeped piazza of an old 
Italian town, came back to the mind's ear — 
** Oh, splendid bella ! " The eye, soon tired 



58 DAYS AND HOURS 

however, of so much dazzling brilHance in the 
polished foliage ; each leaf reflecting back the 
sun, follows the ascending lines of beauty 
up above the pointed roofs, where the soft 
golden rust of the topmost leaves' inner 
lining, meets the deep blue cloudless sky. 
Next the Magnolia, just under the painting- 
room window, is a flexuosa Honeysuckle 
which has not lost a leaf this winter. New 
shoots and twists of brightest green, set 
with young leaves two and two, are spring- 
ing all over it. One tender shoot, indeed, 
has had the heart to curl twice round a 
branch, sending out a length of spray beyond. 
Hard by the flexuosa flourished once a 
fine Gum Cistus. To my sorrow it perished 
in the frost of two winters back. The aroma 
of its gummy foliage, under the noontide sun, 
would penetrate deliciously through the 
open windows. We lost that winter all but 
one of our Gum Cistus, and their destruction 
was so universal that there was a difficulty 
in replacing them. I like the Gum Cistus 
best when growing upon the lawn. The 
snow of fallen petals on the grass seems 
right, and gives no sense of untidiness, there. 



IN A GARDEN. 59 

The loss of the Cistus, however, made room 
for better growth to the old Maiden's-blush 
Rose in the corner, by another window. 
She has hard work, anyhow, to hold her 
own against the flowery smothering of an 
Everlasting Pea, which persists in spread- 
ing beyond all bounds, notwithstanding the 
hints it yearly receives from knife and spade. 
Further on, still under the south front, a 
white Hepatica (Poor Johnny) is already 
shyly blooming. The root is sheltered by 
its own undecayed leaves ; other plants of 
the same kind being quite bare. Hepaticas 
in England almost always look discontented, 
and this is no marvel to any who have 
seen them wild in their own place. I re- 
member as clear as yesterday the joy of 
finding the blue Hepatica for the first time. 
It was in a narrow lovely valley at Men- 
tone, on a mossy bank beside the little 
stony river. We were gathering Violets, 
which abound in that place ; but on the 
edge of the bank, and over its steep side 
intermingled with deep Moss and Ferns, 
there was another blue, which was not the 
blue of Violets. It was like the surprise 



6o DAYS AND HOURS 

and wonder of a new world thus unawares 
to come upon such a flower — the beloved of 
childhood — in such rich profusion — a flower 
we had never seen before that happy day 
save in rare scanty patches, in some damp 
garden border ! About the same time I saw 
also both the pink and white Hepaticas, 
from the Pine woods on the slopes of the 
Alps Maritimes. In a corner near the 
Hepaticas is a little patch of Violets with 
Bella Donna Lilies. The Lilies are sending 
up strong, healthy leaves, and that is about 
all they will ever do to please me. Fine, 
good roots were put in six years ago in this 
choice south corner, where I believed they 
could not but do well. But no ; it is in 
vain I watch and hope ! — not one of those 
exquisite "harmonies in pink" I so longto en- 
joy, do they vouchsafe to give me. Possibly 
they may object to the society of the Violets ! 
Primroses have been with us more or less, 
since September last, and now they are more 
abundant than ever — all colours — red, brown, 
yellow, white, sulphur: the garden is quite 
full of Primroses. Roses, also, we have 
scarcely been without all winter. Within 



IN A GARDEN. 6r 

the walled garden there are real red Rose- 
buds, rather tightly closed up, but capable 
of opening any day. Many Rose bushes 
have never lost their old leaves, and some 
are already putting forth new. On the top 
of the wall I perceived to-day a white spot 
— it was a Gloire de Dijon — looking very 
pale, but fully opened ; and below it the 
Macartney and an Apricot Tea Rose are in 
bud. A space of kitchen garden wall by the 
north iron gate is resplendent with Jasminum 
nudiflorum, and close by, the bare branches 
of a fig tree are already pointed with green, 
recalling in a dim way the fig trees of the 
South, which in March glow like great 
branched candlesticks lighted up with flames 
of golden-green, in honour of the coming 
festa of spring. The Pyrus japonica — a 
very old plant — has opened two coral cups. 
But the gem of the whole garden just now 
is a small, most delicately yet brilliantly 
tinted lilac Iris.* The contrast between it 
and the rich dark green of its reed-like 
leaves, amidst of which the flower shines, is 
charming. It is only in the mildest of winters 

* Jt'is Ensata. 



62 DAYS AND HOURS 

that it ventures to appear. Last year the 
date of its blooming first was February loth. 
There are several tufts of foliage, but as 
yet only this one perfect flower, and we find 
rarely more than half-a-dozen in the season. 
In "the land of flowers," however, which I 
believe to be its own, the paths of many 
a Cypress and Ilex-shaded garden must be 
lined with lilac and green, at this very time. 
I often think how little use is made of that 
most poetical of colours, lilac, — *'lalock," as 
our grandmothers used to pronounce it. It 
was Schiller's favourite colour; but I hardly 
know of any one else particularly caring for 
it. Perhaps one reason may be, because it is 
so hard to mix the most lovely shades of lilac 
in painting, or in manufactured stuifs ; and 
then it is so evanescent. Even nature 
herself does not make use of lilac so freely 
as of other colours — yellow, being I almost 
think, her favourite. She has, however, hit 
the mark indeed in the colouring of my lilac 
gem ; there is a sharpness in the flavour 
— so to speak — which makes it perfect. The 
dear little winter Aconite — each bud of pure 
clean yellow surrounded with its green frill 



IN A GARDEN. 6^ 



of leaves — appears here and there among 
the damp dead leaves. Snowdrops are 
showing daily whiter and larger above the 
ground, and all sorts of green peaceful spears 
are piercing in their strength, up through 
the black mould everywhere. 

We have got through some rather im- 
portant work within the past three weeks. 
A new Beech hedge has been planted on 
the open side of a green walk or close, 
already hedged in on one side. I once read 
somewhere of how it is reckoned good for 
the health to walk between Beech hedges, 
the air being purified and freshened by 
passing through the leaves. An old border, 
full of bulbs and Damask Roses, has been 
dug and re-arranged. The Roses, which are 
old plants, will be refreshed and improved 
by the moving, and we shall add some day 
one or two York and Lancaster roses. In 
this border the Grape Hyacinths have in- 
creased so rapidly that it is literally full of 
them, and we are planting them about in 
different places, some under the Deodara 
(Morgan-le faye) on the lawn, with Snow- 
drops and Daffodils. The Deodara is in the 



64 DAYS AND HOURS 

wrong place, and was spreading so much as 
to injure the effect of the Yew hedges. So 
instead of cutting it down, it is trimmed up 
to eight feet or so from the grass : and for 
this act I have had to brave a perfect storm 
of adverse criticism ! In a few months I 
hope the stem will be clothed with Virginia 
creeper, which, when touched by autumn's 
fiery finger, will become a pillar of flame, 
while wreaths of white Clematis (Virgin's 
bower) are to light up the green in summer. 
Then we have been planting out four fine 
tree Paeonies on the turf by the entrance 
drive. In their season they will be as 
beautiful as great cabbage roses. 

There have been two days of frost and 
bitter cold, and yet the impatient flowers are 
not discouraged. At the further end of the 
broad walk, down among the broken Fern 
and withered leaves, a sense of colour is felt 
in the border as one passes by. Ompha- 
lodes verna (would that dear English names 
were possible!)'" is wide awake, and little 

* Since writing this, I learn that the English name 
is French Forget-me-not, and that it is a flower, once 
beloved of Queen Marie Antoinette. 



IN A GARDEN. 65 

eyes of coerulean blue are looking upwards. 
The rock Roses are full of bud, and small 
variegated-leaved Periwinkles, on a low wall, 
already begin to tip their hanging sprays 
with stars of misty grey. But the strangest 
effort of all, is a Foxglove spire of buds, 
rising well up from its leaf-crowned root 
on an ancient stump of Wistaria. 

The mention of all these flowers would 
make it seem, I fear, as if our garden were 
even now a sort of flowery Paradise. The 
truth is a sad contrast to every such idea ; 
for though the beautiful things are all 
in truth there, it would be difficult to de- 
scribe the heavy gloom and damp of the 
whole place. And so one turns more often 
than usual to the greenhouse for consolation. 
Small as ours is — only about fifteen paces 
long — it is large enough for as much pleasure 
as I desire, under glass. To me the open 
garden is daily bread, the greenhouse " the 
honey that crowns the repast." There 
happens at this time to be a chord of colour 
there, worth noting — ivory whiteness of 
Roman Hyacinths, green of all exquisite 
gradations, pale yellow of Meg Merrilies 

5 



66 DAYS AND HOURS IN A GARDEN. 

Chrysanthemums; others of a warmer yellow, 
and pure white ; fairest pink of Primulas, and 
a deep purple note, struck once or twice, of 
Pleroma. What a flower that is ! How 
charming in its way of blooming sideways 
on its stalk to let the sun shine through 
its violet translucence ! 




FEBRUARY, 



With the Trees of the Garden, 




V. 

FEBRUARY. 

and of Mandragora and the Serpent Flower. 

" There never was a juster debt 
Than what the dry do pay for wet ; 
Never a debt was paid more nigh, 
As what the wet do pay for dry ! " 

February 13. — If the West Country farmer's 
rhyme prove true this year, the ** dry " will 
have a heavy debt to pay ! Some of the 
gravel walks in the garden are quite green, 
along the sides where the almost ceaseless 
rain flows down. All our dressed stone — 
sundial, vases, steps — is discoloured and 
green, and will all have to be scrubbed 
with hot water and soap, like the rocks in 



yo DAYS AND HOURS 

the great rockery once described in the 
Gardeners' Chronicle (p. 747, vol. xviii.) A 
large part of the grounds has been under 
water nearly all through the winter ; the 
"wet," however, in which they sometimes 
stand ankle deep for weeks, seems not to 
do any harm to the evergreens here ; whilst 
we get from the floods charming landscape 
effects. I could almost wish the glassy 
meres, with their clear reflections of tree or 
sky, to be permanent. 

I have been looking over and making notes 
of our Fir trees — we have only about a dozen 
or so, I am afraid ! — I find that Pinus Aus- 
triaca thrives better than any other here ; it is 
a regret to me, that we did not plant num- 
bers more of them, instead of wasting years 
in trying to make Scotch Fir succeed. Spruce 
never seems to do well in this part of the 
country; we have two or three old Spruce 
firs which are mere poles, and some much 
younger, which must be cut down to relieve 
our eyes from that garden misery — a sickly 
tree. Only in the *' Fantaisie " are our Spruce 
firs successful, and there, from overcrowding 
— for there are at least ten — they are well- 



IN A GARDEN. 7 1 

nigh spoilt. This little spot has proved good 
for them, I imagine because it was new 
ground, taken in from old unbroken pasture 
and well trenched. One or two others, full 
and healthy of a few years' growth, suddenly 
went off last summer ; it was as if a blighting 
wind had scorched their branches, or light- 
ning had seared them. I know no successful 
Spruce plantations anywhere in the neigh- 
bourhood. The soil is gravelly, with chalk 
and flint ; and sometimes trees seem to strike 
their roots down into a subsoil, — perhaps an 
intermittent layer of greensand, — and then 
they go off. But this can scarcely be the only 
cause that so fatally affects our firs. About 
120 miles down west, there is a group of ex- 
tremely fine Spruce Firs that I have known 
for the last thirty years, and when I visited 
them last year I found they had all gone off 
in the same way as ours here. Excelsa 
grandis flourishes equally with Pinus Aus- 
triaca. One fine young plant in the " Fan- 
taisie"was, as one says, "quite a picture" 
in the summer for the perfect symmetry of 
its form, and on the two topmost laterals were 
just two beautifully shaped upright green 



72 DAYS AND HOURS 

cones, crested with amber-coloured gum ! 
I rejoiced in this young tree during all the 
season, but there is a fear since then, that it 
may suffer in its growth from the premature 
effort. The Balm of Gilead Firs, a few of 
which we put in along one side of the turf 
walk, have failed entirely. I meant each to 
become a little rounded beauty, like that one 
planted by my father, which I remember long 
years since as a wonder of aromatic greenery ; 
but these are grey and - stunted, and they all 
wear such a look of age and decay as I fear we 
cannot long endure to see. The crisp leaves, 
however, are as sweet when crumpled in the 
hand as they ought to be. With two or three 
of these piteous little trees, the branches 
show, without losing stiffness, a certain ten- 
dency to droop or turn downwards at the 
extremities. It is rather curious this droop, 
affected by a few individuals in a Fir 
plantation ! For they do not begin life with 
that intention ; the young tree may be just 
like any other for years, when suddenly one 
branch will be observed turned down, then 
another and another, till finally the whole 
thing is decided, and the tree becomes a 



IN A GARDEN. 73 

" weeper," as some call them. In a 
large plantation in Aberdeenshire some 
years since, I knew one young Silver Fir 
out of all the others that grew itself into a 
drooping form, so that it seemed at last to 
draw down its branches close together, as 
one would draw a cloak around one in the 
cold. It was then ten or twelve feet high, 
and now it must indeed be a remarkable 
object if it has grown and drooped at the 
same rate. Our Douglas Fir (Sir Bedivere) 
has known this temptation to droop, but 
evidently the feeling of the mass of his 
branches is dead against the idea, and it will 
come to nothing. 

This accident or sport is common in other 
trees all over the world I suppose, and one 
of the most ancient nomadic patterns of 
Persian rugs, depicts on either side the Tree 
of Life, the columnar Cypress and the 
drooping Cypress, beside a little tomb. 

In various odd nooks and corners of the 
garden, I know where to find a few little 
old Cephalonian Pines, — all that remain out 
of a number we once had. They are only 
about 4 or 5 feet high, yet they were grown 



74 DAYS AND HOURS 

from seed over a quarter of a century ago. 
Like poor old useless retainers, they have 
followed the fortunes of the family, and we 
have become attached to one another. One 
amongst the original number became a fine 
specimen — and perished. The rest have 
never had a chance of growing up, for every 
spring their new buds are nipped, so they 
remain still the same, with a sort of look of 
old young trees. T am especially interested 
in the welfare of one of the Cephalonians, 
who lives in an English Yew. Those 
two are certainly bosom friends ! The Yew 
itself was only half a tree, spared out of 
charity on what seemed a bare chance of 
surviving. The Cephalonian stood near and 
shivered, and lost its buds every spring, 
while the Yew crept nearer and nearer, till 
at last its thick dark foliage reached the little 
Pine, and so grew on ; and now the Yew 
fairly holds it within its warm, comfortable 
embrace. Some say, "What a mistake to 
leave them thus!" I say, "They shall 
not be parted ; " so the two remain together, 
and grow quite happily in each other's arms. 
Oddly enough, the Pine seems to be 



IN A GARDEN. 75 



assimilating itself in colour, and partly in 
form, with the Yew, so that it is not easy to 
distinguish them. But if the Cephalonian at 
last out-tops its benefactor, what will happen 
then ? At times the space of ground over 
which we reign seems to be very much too 
small ; and I incline to envy the possession 
of land, with room enough to plant, — for 
there can be no more engrossing interest of 
its kind than to watch the growth of trees, 
their manners and customs. I would plant 
at once acres of Ilex Oak. What shelter 
they would make ! And in a congenial soil 
they would not be too slow of growth. There 
should be broad bands of Beech and Oak, 
and long groves of Larch, delicious in spring 
for the fragrance of their green and pink- 
tipped tassels. And there should be planta- 
tions of Fir — Scotch Fir, for the delight of 
their healthy blue-green in youth, and for the 
glory of their great red stems in age ; and 
Spruce Fir, with all their charm of deep 
mosses underneath, and their loveliness in 
spring of starry winter green (Trientalis 
Europse), and " the rathe Primrose : " and 
for tne music of the winds among their 



76 DAYS AND HOURS 

branches, and the velvet darkness of their 
colour under summer skies. {Mem. — The 
winter-green would have to be sent us 
from the North.) 

Our great work of last month has been an 
alteration at the east end of the garden. A 
quickset hedge, forty or fifty years old, is 
moved back, so as to take in from " the 
park" a bit of waste ground ; the gravel path 
that ran under the hedge is widened, and a 
block of Laurels cut through. By this means 
a turf way, leading north and south, is made 
to enter the improved walk, whose chief 
attraction is the border of old damask Roses. 
Plum trees and Pears stand along the border 
amongst the Roses, and a large perennial 
yellow Lupin, in which thrushes have been 
known to make their nests. In the middle 
of the hedge grew a fine young Elder. I 
had long promised that Elder it should never 
be cut down, so when the Hawthorns were 
removed the tree remained, arching across 
the path to meet a Plum tree on the other 
side. An Elder in full bloom is such a 
beautiful thing, that it is painful to feel 
obliged to destroy it ; but Elders have such 



IN A GARDEN. 77 

an unfortunate knack of appearing where 
they are not wanted ! The birds sow Elder 
seeds in the clefts of trees, in chinks of 
walls, flower borders — all sorts of incon- 
venient places, now that the berries are no 
longer requisitioned to make Elder wine. 
In old-fashioned days it was worth having a 
cold, to enjoy a nightcap of Elder wine from 
the saucepan on the hob ! So this one tree 
is preserved in honour, as compensation 
for those others which are no more. I am 
not in the least superstitious, but it is 
rather uncanny to cut down an old Elder ! 
Eldritch legends and spells have clung to the 
tree in days of yore, and have even come 
down to our own times. I used to listen at 
my mother's knee, and beg again and again 
for the story of the fairy changeling. The 
interest of the story never failed, and the 
rhyme never tired, about the enchanted 
hare, who ran — 

" Runie and runie the Eildon tree, 
And seven times mnie the Eildon tree." 

According to custom I was rather on the 
look-out for treasures, when the old hedge 



78 DAYS AND HOURS 

was dug up, but nothing appeared excepting 
a huge yellow bone, and a gigantic root of 
White Briony. The uncouth thing bore a 
strange resemblance to some organised being 
with arms and legs — something like an 
Octopus in full swim, only twenty times as 
big, and yet also with a sort of human aspect ! 
I was told it was a Mandrake (though it did 
not shriek on being pulled up), and so I 
desired it should be carefully buried, in 
order that the household might not be dis- 
turbed by its groans at night. In India the 
sounds emitted by a Mandrake in the dark 
night are said to be sometimes heartrending. 
And so the witch, in the Masque of Queens^ 

" I last night lay all alone 
O' the ground to heare the mandrake grone." 

I wonder if White Briony is really the true 
Mandrake, about which there must seriously 
be something mysterious. I find in the 
dictionary, " Mandragora, (Mandrake) a 
powerful soporific. Mandrage, a plant said 
to be so called because it points out that a 
cave is near." I know no more, besides the 
wild traditions, and this vision the other day, 



IN A GARDEN. 79 

in the twilight, of a white misshapen figure 
lying on the earth. There are, however, few 
things more exquisitely graceful than the 
Black and White Brionies. Black Brionyis 
rare in our part of Buckinghamshire. In this 
garden three White Brionies have leave to 
dwell. All winter the mystic root lies hidden 
awaiting the appointed time. On a day in 
spring or early summer, suddenly upsprings 
a group of delicate pale green stalks, and 
they, as soon as they have seen the sun in 
heaven, delay not to put forth all the strength 
stored under the earth in the big ugly root ; 
and before many days the green stalks have 
grown into a beautiful leafy plant, mantling 
over whatever is nearest of tree or bush, 
with leaves of most fanciful cut, and a thou- 
sand ringlets of circling, sensitive tendrils, 
By-and-by there will be a whole firmament 
of little star-like flowers, greenish-white in 
colour, — all either male or female according 
to the plant. In October an unhappy 
collapse sets in. Life ebbs fast from the 
flaccid stalks and tendrils, dying away, sink- 
ing down, down into the buried root, till 
nothing remains but a dry colourless shroud, 



8o DAYS AND HOURS 

clinging close over the supporting shrub, 
which scarce can breathe, till a friendly 
hand in due course clears the whole thing 
off. 

I think I never saw a finer show of white 
Arums than we have just now. There is 
the grandest luxuriance of foliage, with thick 
tall stems, crowned by spathies in spiral lines 
of perfect grace. The rich texture of these 
flowers is marvellous ; white as the drifted 
snow, with a lemon scent. Our success is 
perhaps due, not only to good management, 
but to what one may call, imported bulbs. 
Four years ago they were thrown out of a 
garden at Cannes, as worthless rubbish, on 
to the roadside. I passed that way one day, 
while a little peasant girl was collecting some 
of these bulbs in her pinafore. I asked her 
what they were } " Des lis ! " she said. So 
I immediately gathered up some for myself, 
and they were done up in newspapers and 
packed in our trunks and brought home. In 
grim contrast to these joyous flowers of light 
is the Serpent Flower, a tropical member 
of the Arum family. I saw it, once only, 
eleven years ago, in the beautiful garden of 



IN A GARDEN. 8 1 



Palazzo Orenga, at Mortola, near Venti- 
miglia. It grew on the edge of a ravine, under 
the deep shade of a low stone wall. Right up 
from a cluster of black-spotted leaves the 
centre spiral rose to about ten or twelve 
inches, bending over at the top into a sort of 
hood, like the hooded head of a cobra. The 
creature — flower, I cannot say — took the atti- 
tude exactly of a snake preparing to spring — 
the body marked and spotted the same as a 
snake, with the hood greyish-brown. The 
whole thing seemed something more than 
a good imitation only of the reptile whose 
name it bears. The first glance gave a sort of 
shock, as if on a sudden one had become 
aware of the actual presence at one's feet of 
a deadly serpent; and yet this terrifying 
object is, I believe, used by the Indians as 
an antidote to snake-bite. 

All over the Olive grounds of the same 
country where the Serpent Arum is acclima- 
tised, about this time or early in March 
appear the little brown *' Sporacci " — tiny 
hooded Arums of quaint form, little odd 
monks with yellow tongues hanging oui 
(Arum Arisarum). My window is full of Paper 

6 



82 DAYS AND HOURS IN A GARDEN. 

Narcissus — Narcissus is Remembrance ; and 
for the sake of past days, I love it — they 
succeed a set of blue Roman Hyacinths, 
dear also from association, and beautiful in 
their full tones of blue and green. The per- 
fume of both flowers bring back vividly the 
sweet South, where I knew them wild. I 
must end with a little bit out of a letter sent 
me from that southern land which has the 
power to create lovers of Nature : — 

** I am longing for sunshine, to bring to 
life all the flowers I am watching for near 
the torrent beds. My ignorance of flowers 
has this advantage, that each leaf is a 
mystery to me, and I know not what flower 
it frames, so each will be a surprise as it 
appears." 




MARCH. 



" Out of the Snow, the Snowdrop — 
Out of Death comes Life ; " . . . 
David Gray. 




VI. 



MARCH. 

Of Rooks, and the close of day — Of Fairy Garlands, 
Snowdrops, and Wild Ivy. 

March 9. — We are rejoicing in the fulfil- 
ment of a long-felt wish, and at last we 
possess a rookery ! There are the nests, 
seven of them, in the Elms, in full view of 
our east windows. The grand old trees 
have always seemed to us a most tempting 
position for the rooks, who themselves have 
half thought so too. But it has taken them 
long to come to a decision. On many a 
spring morning for these eleven years past 
have we observed them settling upon the 
trees in hundreds. But after a short interval 



S6 DAYS AND HOURS 

of noise and clamour they would rise and 
depart. They were only coquetting a 
little with us, or bent on kindling delusive 
hopes. *' 111 blows the wind that profits 
nobody," however ; so the storm of April 29 
last year, which uprooted some of our best 
trees, laid low also part of a neighbouring 
rookery. The shock seems to have decided 
the rooks, and to have won their confidence 
in our noble 300-year-old Elms. The seven 
nests were begun and nearly built in about 
as many days. How busy the old rooks are! 
And how, with no hands and only one beak, 
they can make up those neat bundles of moss 
and dry grass, just like potatoes, that we 
see them carrying to line the nests with, is 
difficult to understand. During the rough 
snowy weather no work was done ; but a 
rook or two sat all day just above the nests, 
on the very topmost twigs, swaying in the 
wind, as if to watch and test their security. 
One evening at dusk, after the rooks had gone 
off for the night, an inquisitive starling came 
peeping about. He flew up from his own 
lower range, visiting every nest ; made a 
minute inspection inside and out, and then 



IN A GARDEN 87 

decamped in a great hurry, afraid of being 
found out. 

Near the great Ehns, but far below the new 
black colony, is the dovecote. Beautiful 
white fantail pigeons, varied by two or three 
purple-necked greys, here live joyous lives. 
On the steep, heather-thatched roof they 
preen, and coo, and make love together, or 
rise with sudden dash into the air, and 
wheel in circling flight over the lawns and 
flower-beds. On sunny days when they 
pass and repass the house, swift gleams flash 
along the rooms within ; brown oak panell- 
ings reflecting back the sunshine from their 
silver plumes. Often, through long summer 
afternoons, will these bright shadows come 
and go upon the walls, like visions of happy 
ghosts upon the wing. It is not all poetry 
however, with our fantail s, I am afraid ; for 
the handsomest of them all, choked himself 
with too greedily swallowing a slug one day, 
and was found stretched dead upon the lawn. 
Sometimes a poor tailless fugitive, escaped 
from the nearest public-house shooting- 
match, will take refuge with our pigeons 
and feed shyly v/ith them for a day or 



88 DAYS AND HOURS 

SO ; but only one ever remained, and she 
went to live with the bantam cock, whose 
pert little wife had deserted him. 

The day has been cold, with scattered 
flakes of snow falling ; and now in the grey 
still evening, the air is suffused with a certain 
splendid sobriety of colouring, if it may be 
so described. The turf has lost that living 
green it showed a month ago, for since then 
bitter winds have swept the garden ; the 
Yews look dark and sombre, dark pyramids 
and lines ; the older Yews of large and natural 
growth, are powdered over with dim gold-dust. 
Such profuse bloom on the Yews seems to 
soften their blackness. Beyond the Yew 
hedges' dusky outline, glows a richer green 
of Laurel, Cedar, and Firs, with the asset 
sheen of Beech, half seen between tne bud- 
ding fulness of Thorn and Laburnum. Be- 
yond all stand the Elms ; they form a back- 
ground of infinite delicacy, purpling under 
that nameless change more felt than seen, 
which the turn of the year has brought. 
Nearer home, in this pale evening light, the 
hoary old garden walls, with here and there 
a ruddier tint of redder brick, or faintest 



IN A GARDEN. 89 

blush upon them of Pyrus japonica, join their 
mellow tones to the intense but quiet colour 
of the hour. A mass of common sweet- 
scented white Clematis, whose summer 
glory has long since melted into a softly 
shaded cloud of thin withered stalks, hides 
one pillar of the central iron gate, and half 
enwreathes a sculptured vase above ; sere 
leaves of grassy wild things break the 
straight line of mossy, lichened coping. 
Timid thrushes with spotted breast, and 
little hedge-sparrows in sober brown appear 
upon the lawn, since labour for the day is 
done and the garden is deserted. A tomtit, 
quaintly liveried, has made the square- 
topped Yewen hedge his hunting ground 
(Yewen, was the pretty old word in Spen- 
ser's time : may we not revive it 7 ) But 
now a bold gay blackbird, leaps up upon the 
stone ball that surmounts the ivied corner of 
the wall. His jet-black plumage and " the 
golden dagger of his bill," give just that 
touch of strength, wanted to complete the 
consonance of lovely colour. By-and-by he 
will be down again upon the grass to flirt his 
tail and flout the thrushes till he remains 



90 BAYS AND HOURS 

alone, master of the field. This is a dull 
time for the cock birds all over the place. 
Awhile ago they had such games of an even- 
ing on the lawn ! chasing each other in and 
out between the Yews and Box tree, and 
every blackbird had two hens to play hide 
and seek with. But now the lawful wives 
are sitting, and there's an end of the fun. 

The garden has been cold and joyless ever 
since March 4. It is true that morning after 
morning about sunrise, a treat for the eye 
has been prepared by the Crocus beds with a 
succession of white frosts, but it is one could 
well be spared. Meanwhile, it certainly is 
the prettiest sight imaginable, these Crocuses 
thrown lightly as it were, upon the frosted 
turf in garlands of amethyst and amber. 
The rime, covering up all varied greens and 
browns of earth and grass with a veil of 
pearly grey, gives a most pure and charming 
result. If you look quite near — at the 
purple wreath especially — the flowers seem 
all dipped in pounded sugar, crystallised for 
a fairy's feast ! Except this pretty morning 
show there is as yet but little joy. Fewer 
flowers than in January even, and such as 



IN A GARDEN. 91 

are willing to bloom, cast down on the 
ground. Primroses and the earliest Daffodils 
are thus laid low, conquered by overmaster- 
ing cold. Violets, too, which before the frost 
began were almost more perfumed and of 
finer bloom than ever I remember, are 
pinched and shrunken. Snowdrops also 
failed, before the severe frost: destroyed 
untimely by excessive rain. The Snowflake 
(Leucojum vernum) appeared earlier than 
usual, and I look forward to the summer 
Snowflake later on. These lovely flowers 
came from an eyot on the Thames, where 
they grow wild. A fine double Snowdrop 
played an amusing little freak. The southern 
face of a Yew hedge under which it grew, 
had I suppose, gradually overgrown the 
plant, so its stalks had to preternaturally 
lengthen themselves, growing up within the 
hedge till forth peeped the flowers from 
various little interspaces, as if the Yew 
itself were breaking out into Snowdrops ! 
One of these long stems measured 16 inches, 
and the blossoms, larger than common, 
looked as if they enjoyed the joke. 

Few indeed are the flowers to be recorded 



92 DAYS AND HOURS 

in bloom. There is a pink tuft or two of 
Dog's-tooth Violet (long lines of these if 
there were space sufficient would make great 
show) ; Grape Hyacinths (looking very un- 
ripe) are an inch or so above-ground. The 
sweet little dwarf Daffodil, with bent head, 
smiles to itself in the accustomed place. A 
few Polyanthuses, small blue Periwinkles 
mixed with yellow Primroses ; Pulmonaria, 
seared and pinched ; blue Scilla, in niggard 
clumps, quite unlike its usual bounteous, 
radiant beauty — these, with bushes of rosy 
Ribes, checked but ready to break into bloom, 
are about all we can boast. There are, 
indeed, the Crocuses, whose best days, 
however, will soon be ended. The mixed 
border of these in three colours — yellow, 
white, and lilac — would have been perfect 
had our friends the field-mice, instead of 
choosing the lilac alone for their own pri- 
vate consumption, shown more impartiality. 
Their taste is certainly remarkable, for the 
yellow were the fattest bulbs. 

1 9//?. — After a day of rain it is wonderful 
how quickly Daffodils and Primroses have 



IN A GARDEN. 



93 



picked themselves up. The Grape Hyacinths 
have grown two inches since morning, and 
begun to colour in proportion, or so at least 
it seems ; and tiny golden buds, unperceived 
before, burgeon all overthe Kerria. Although 
Daffodils as yet are few, there is already 
a Polyanthus Narcissus unfolded, and a few 
Narcissus of deep orange-yellow, have arisen 
behind the lilac winter Irises. The Apricot 
bloom is chiefly brown, but all will not be 
lost. On the Peach trees there are buds, 
and some expanded blooms of heavenly pink. 
I find a curious small deception has been 
practised upon me by a plant in the east 
border. I had often observed two patches 
of greenish worn-out-looking moss there, and 
at last inquired of the Gardener the reason of 
their being permitted. He pointed out that 
it was not moss, but the green bare roots of 
a Violet, which I am well acquainted with 
when its disguise is thrown off. It is a pied 
Dog Violet, from Villa Clara, Baveno. We 
have had it now for some years. The 
flower is scentless, striped white and purple, 
of large size, on a long stalk. But flower 
and leaf are yet a long way off. 



94 DAYS AND HOURS 

The pruning and trimming of all the Ivy 
walls and festoons has been done. The 
result for the time is as ugly as it is desir- 
able. Ivy grows so lavishly here that it has 
to be kept well in hand, and many whom 
it favours less, have said they envied us 
our Ivy. More than once we have had 
to choose between some Tree, or a canopy of 
Ivy. It is like a beautiful carpet underneath 
a long row of Elms, where nothing else 
would grow ; indeed, wherever there happen 
to be bits too overshadowed for grass or 
otherwise unsatisfactory, we put in Ivy ; it 
is sure to understand, and to do what is 
required. My favourite sort is the wild 
English Ivy, and no other has a right to 
grow on the House. Its growth is slow, 
and sure ; it always grows to beauty, and 
never to over-richness. The loveliness of 
its younger shoots and of the deeply cut 
leaves might inspire either poet or painter ! 
To either I would say, wherever on your 
tree, or fence, or house-wall, you find it 
beginning to spring, cherish it ; for years it 
will do no harm, and if you are true to your 
art, and therefore know that small things are 



IN A GARDEN. 95 

not too small for you, it will repay your love 
a hundredfold. Wild Ivy is best where it 
comes up of itself, it clings then so close and 
flat. A thrush sat on her nest built on quite 
the outside of a Holly, two feet from the 
ground, while the men were at work prun- 
ing an Ivy wall, — large swathes of Ivy falling 
close to her. She had faith in us, and never 
feared. 

Our grove of white Arums in the green- 
house is still a fine sight, plants from four 
to five feet high with enormous leaves. 
The spathes, however, though fine, are less 
so than at first, when many of them measured 
over eight inches across. The Mar6chal 
Niel Rose, will not give us this season 
anything like the six hundred great yellow 
Roses we have had from him these last 
three years. He seems to be failing a little, 
somehow. But every morning I have a 
foretaste of summer in the glowing heap 
of beautiful Roses of several kinds, brought 
in to me before breakfast. And with them 
there are Gloxinias, marvellous in their 
size and splendour of deep colouring. 
They are succeeding a lot of most curious 



g6 DAYS AND HOURS IN A GARDEN. 

looking Tydaes, — orange and dusky pink 
profusely spotted. Both these flowers sur- 
prise one by the length of time they remain 
fresh when cut. 




APRIL. 



'^ To the Wise a Fact is True Poetry, 
and the most Beautiful of Fables." 

Emerson. 




VII. 
APRIL. 

Of Daffodils— Coltsfoot— An Archangel— Gold Wrens 
and the little Vedova. 

April 9. — The garden is full of Daffodils. 
Yellow flowers and green leaves form a 
most bea'itiful combination of colours when 
laid on by Nature's hand. Every part of the 
garden now, has its show of single or 
double Daffodils, and yet there is not one too 
many. Lovely always, they are loveliest 
perhaps when growing in the grass. There, 
** the green world they live in " shows them 
off better than when surrounded by garden 
mould. Excepting one large single-flower- 
ing plant under the east wall, our finest 
Daffodils grow in the cool north border. 



lOO DAYS AND HOURS 

One thinks of "Enid" in her faded silk, 
like a blossom " that lightly breaks a faded 
flower-sheath" when the Daffodils appear. 
Indeed, one can scarcely look on them in 
their beauty, without recalling the lines of 
some familiar quotation ; mine shall only be 
from the children's nursery song-book — 

" Daffy-down-dilly has come up to town 
In a yellow petticoat and a green gown," 

(Poor Daffodilla ! for yellow is jealousy, and 
green is forsaken.) The old jingle paints 
Avell enough the Daffodil's outside. What- 
ever else may lie within the golden depth of 
her cup and about her silken petals, all the 
poetry of the Daffodil, has been said and 
sung from old, old days, up to our own time by 
those happy few whose thoughts shape them- 
selves in verse. Soon there will be a bloom- 
ing of many varieties in the garden, but at 
this moment only three abound, and of these 
I hardly know which most to praise. There 
is the single variety, with rather narrow 
almost pointed petals, and trumpet tube of a 
deeper shade of yellow; I cannot distinguish 
this one from Narcissus incomparabilis of 



IN A GARDEN. loi 



the Riviera. Then there is the semi-double, 
(old Parkinson's Narcissus Major, '' confined 
to the gardens of the curious"), which I 
sometimes think a still more handsome 
flower, from its rich folded depths of colour. 
Its prime, however, lasts but a few days ; 
the full tube seems then to overspread 
and split, and a confusion of doubleness 
ensues which mars its perfect form. Then 
there is the old real Daffodil— quite apart 
from the so-called Lent Lily, — with very 
pale, broad-leaved corolla, and true Narcis- 
sus-shaped cup. When this doubles itself 
there is again a loss of grace. I call it the 
real Daffodil, because years ago when that 
was a flower not thought so much of— this, 
as I remember, was the usual kind seen in 
gardens. I believe in those days the Daffodil 
— whose very name is music in our ears 
— was considered almost a vulgar (!) flov/er, 
'* it was so very common." Now it is so 
common in another way, one could half 
wish that it— with the Sunflower— had re- 
mained undiscovered, or only bloomed to 
grace old cottage garden plots, or as the 
Lent Lily, in wild woodland ways for the 



102 DAYS AND HOURS 

delight of simple village children. Is it 
fault or failing in human Nature that inclines 
us to turn from things that all the world 
admires ? I only know that somehow, one 
loves one's own love to be for . one's self 
alone ! and I do not care to see cartfuls of 
Daffodils sent up to London. . . . There is a 
part of the garden on the north side which 
just now gives me strange pleasure. There 
we leave the borders to grow pretty much 
how they will. In summer on one side 
there is a green forest of Male-Fern, Bramble, 
wild Ivy, and low-grown Berberis ; but at 
this time the scene is different. Great double 
Daffodils rest their golden heads upon inter- 
lacing red-brown Fern and branching glossy 
Berberis. A few shafts of narrow blue- 
green leaves pierce through and amongst 
the brown and burnt- sienna colour; Pulmo- 
naria — taking heart after all the withering 
frosts — breaks into clouds of flower, all blue 
and pink, with dusks of mottled leaf between. 
And among the Pulmonaria crops up by 
chance, in the humblest way, a healthy 
beautiful Archangel, or Dead Nettle, set 
with blossoms downy white. 



IN A GARDEN. 103 

"More springs in the garden than the 
gardener ever sowed," is an old saying. Just 
the other side the walk there chances — who 
knows how ? — a charming little plant which 
curiously attracts me. Unlike " the small 
Celandine," it never had a poet, so far as I 
know, to sing its praise, although the Painter- 
poet of England — William Blake — disdained 
not to immortalise it. In his illustrations 
to the Book of Job it occurs, the character 
of the flowers unmistakably given by a few 
master-touches. Yet this little Coltsfoot is 
full of interest, and the little satiny sun- 
flower that crowns each pinkish fleshy 
flower-stalk is, in its way, quaintly unique. 
The specimen [vide Dryasdust) in our north 
border has rooted partly under and amongst 
the lowest leaves of an Aucuba, partly in 
the Box edging. I think it has been in a 
vague way not unknown to me for many 
past seasons, but I have passed it unob- 
servantly, only perhaps remarking to myself, 
** Ah, there you are again ! " One day, 
however, it drew down my attention to look 
more closely, and since, it has had sometimes 
half-a-dozen visits in the day. I wished to 



I04 DAYS AND HOURS 

see if there were any set hours for its un- 
folding and closing ; it seemed so odd to 
find the little flowers fast shut at near 8 a.m., 
with the sunshine bright upon them. Then 
I found they did not open till between 1 1 
and 12 mid-day. One, placed in water, at 
a south window opened itself wide before 
nine in the morning, and at noon the small 
yellow disc was spread so broad that its 
rays turned over the other way at the edges. 
You could scarcely find on any flower's face 
an expression of more serene content. Then 
both the growing flowers and the one in the 
window began to close at precisely the same 
time — about ten minutes to 4 p.m. ; and the 
closing process with both only came to an end 
at near six. This slowness may have been, 
perhaps, because the flowers were then, all 
rather past their first youth. In grey cloudy 
weather they hardly unclosed at all. The 
spot where this Coltsfoot has chosen to grow 
must be unsympathetic, for after the early 
morning a light chequered shade of Holly 
from over the way, veils in some degree its 
coveted sun supply. When its time comes 
the little flower dies very prettily ; it only 



IN A GARDEN. 105 



changes to a dull saffron hue, and then shuts 
up for ever. 

The all too brief delight of hearing the 
birds sing in the evening is now at its best ; 
about seven they begin. The other day, at 
6.30, scarce a note was heard through all the 
garden. The rooks were cawing in a whisper 
their hoarse good-nights ; two wood-pigeons 
answered each other from trees far apart in 
the fields, with an interrupted chant — " slow 
to begin and never ending." Suddenly, a 
little before seven — about three minutes 
before — one after another the thrushes 
awoke into song. The whole air echoed and 
resounded with their music. It was the 
same time precisely, as on the day before. 
How do they tell the hour thus to a minute } 
Not certainly by the clock ; for seven struck 
from the village church tower just three 
minutes after the concert began. Can it be 
the first star appearing that sets for them the 
moment to begin ? Looking up, the pole star 
shone from heaven right overhead. Does 
some " wise thrush," sitting on a topmost 
branch, with full bright orbs turned heaven- 
wards, mark this sudden diamond in the sky, 



Io6 DAYS AND HOURS 

and then at once pour forth his flood of liquid 
melody, the signal for his fellows waiting 
round to take up the song ? We watched near 
the Douglas Fir, I and the satin-coated colley 
dog ; he listened too, lying on the grass, 
rather bored but patient, with ears alert : 
and twilight deepened, and star after star 
stole out upon the dusk, while the orange 
west grew dim and changed, and louder 
still re-echoed the ecstatic numbers from 
every bush and tree, and from many a 
hedgerow in the fields beyond. In all this 
multitude of bird voices not a discord inter- 
venes ; it is an orchestra tuned to one key, 
and the fuller the tones of the unnumbered 
instruments, the deeper and more entire is 
the concord. How is it done } There is no 
conductor with his baton ! . . . But the dinner- 
bell rings, and we must leave the concert 
and all its sweet throated minstrels in full 
song — and the garden, with its refined and 
lovely influences of perfect harmony, its 
budding trees and tuneful thickets of Fir and 
Laurel, — to the Daffodils and the stars. 
The contrast is somewhat gross, of roast 
mutton and lighted lamps ! . . . But to those 



IN A GARDEN. 107 

who prefer their Currant bushes to the songs 
of " God's poet hid in foliage green," what 
can be said ? — I do not believe such persons 
exist. 

The Sweet Briar hedge along the walk 
leading to the wicket-gate in the entrance 
drive begins to scent the air. We do not 
make enough of such a treasure as Sweet 
Briar is. Some day we must plant some 
near the windows, for pleasant perfume after 
rain. It is a favourite idea, too obscure to 
be a doctrine or even a theory, that the 
sweet smells of flowers and aromatic leaves 
and all kinds of green things, have a certain 
virtue for dififerent conditions of health. 
Here are a few examples, and I am afraid 
I do not know many more. To smell wild 
Thyme, will renew the spirits and vital 
energy in long walks under an August sun. 
The pure, almost pungent scent of Tea Rose 
Marechal Niel, is sometimes invigorating in 
any lowness of mind or body. Sweet Briar 
promotes cheerfulness. Yellow Bedstraw 
(Galium verum), Cowslip, Wallflower, 
Damask and pink China Roses, Plum blos- 
som, and notably Sweet Gale or Bog Myrtle, 



Io8 DAYS AND HOURS 

and wild white Honeysuckle, refresh the 
spirits: while the smell of ground Ivy, Char- 
lock, Woodruff, Rosemary, and fresh-cut 
grass seems to be a refreshment to the body. 
Hawthorn is very doubtful, and Lime 
blossom is dreamy. These scents are 
*' transparent," and are also, except the two 
first, more or less uncertain, to be caught on 
the wing, as it were. The more positive 
and *' opaque" scents, such as those of the 
Gardenia, Lilies, Narcissus, Jonquil, etc., 
seem less potent for the spirits than for the 
body. The subject is full of indistinctness, 
since that which is life to one may be death 
to many. I have known an instance of even 
white Sweet Peas and white Pink being 
unendurable, and yet both are what I call 
*' transparent." There may also be a system 
of mixed flowers. Small scarlet Nasturtium 
and lemon-scented Pelargonium are good 
together, and seem to have a pleasant effect 
on the mind, and as the venerable Parkin- 
son says, they ** make a delicate Tussimussie, 
or Nosegay, both for sight, and scent." The 
large Italian white Jasmine, mixed with 
Marie Louise Violets, is comforting. Alto- 



IN A GARDEN. 109 

gether I think the idea may be something 
more than a mere fantastic whim. ''' 

April 1-]. — This morning, before 8 o'clock, 
the whole garden felt like spring. The 
turf was brightly green, and shining with 
dew, and birds and grass and flowers were 
unconsciously at ease and happy for the 
moment under the warm sunlight. The 
unwonted warmth made a robin so bold and 
confident, that he flew up against me in 
the most playful way, and then perched on a 
young Beech, flapping his little wings with 
a merry twinkle in his eye. All about and 
in and out the Stone Pine, to them one 
huge world of insect life, flitted a pair of 
golden crested wrens as busy as possible, 

* Nearly twelve months after writing thus about 
healthful Flower-scents, I found in Austen's "Treatise 
of Fruit-trees," 1657, a curious confirmation of my 
idea, which appears indeed to be an old one. He 
writes, " Health is preserved by pleasant and whole- 
some Odors, and perfumes found in the garden of 
Fruit-trees. . . . from the blossomes of all the Fruit- 
trees. . . . which are not simply Healthfull, but are 
accompted cordiall ; chearing and refreshing the heart, 
and vitali spirits." — Note^ April 1884. 



no DAYS AND HOURS 

the flutter of their tiny wings making just as 
much sound, as might two butterflies. The 
sun glanced now and then, for a moment, on 
the cock-bird's golden-streak, the hen held a 
filmy white insect of some kind in her bill, 
and would on no account show the way to 
her nest, so long as she was watched. It 
was unkind, I fear, to tease so minute a 
creature and I soon went another way ; and 
then both wrens made a little rush into the 
brambly ivy- smothered trunk of the tree. 
We refrain from too curiously searching for 
the nest, though I think the young family 
would be worth seeing ! In the morning 
light a host of single Daffodils shone like 
pale gold ; double white Wind-flowers have 
begun to bloom (there grows a yellow wild 
one * not far from us, but I have only seen 
it after it had been transplanted into a garden )j 
and many kinds of Narcissus. The Pasque- 
flower has been put out of its reckoning 
by the unusually early Easter, it is only just 

* Anemone ranunculoides is alluded to. The 
gardener of the garden where I saw it assured me 
it grew wild in a little wood close by, but I did not 
myself see it wild. 



A GARDEN. ii 



in bud. The grass walk in the *'P'antaisie" 
was too heavy with dew to be pleasant, so 
I only looked across the gate at the Narcissus 
and flaming star Anemones. In the clear 
sunlight, lilac patches of Aubrietia side by 
side with clean white Arabis, seem doubly 
charming. 

How eagerly one seizes all possible points 
of beauty in such a severe trying season. I 
"^ver before remember our having to water 
the garden in April ; it has been however 
quite necessary, for as yet only two slight 
April showers have fallen, and the clumps of 
Narcissus poeticus were failing. Tulips are 
flowering with stalks barely one inch long, 
and Crowr Imperials half miss their usual 
'' stately beautifulness." One day of soft 
warm rain would set all right, and give us 
an almost Roman spring, so suddenly would 
the garden become clothed in bloom, and the 
leaves burst out upon the trees. King-cups 
begin to glass themselves in our narrow 
watercourse, and reeds to thicken greenly 
along the brink. The long line of Primroses 
along the allk verte is a sad failure. As soon 
as the flowers open they are beheaded by 



112 DAYS AND HOURS 

those cruel chaffinches. This is how the 
little painted traitors behave all the while 
they are supposed to be gaily building their 
dainty nests ! Such wholesale execution is, 
I believe, the result of this very dry weather. 
They cut off the flowers to get at the small 
drop of moisture or honey in the calyx. 1 
forgive the chaffinches without any difficulty, 
only wishing that other people could be as 
easily pardoned ; but when the rooks are 
poisoned and our new hopes of a rookery 
nearly frustrated, it is hard to be very for- 
giving ! Some short-sighted farmer has 
done this cruel deed. The poor rooks 
dropped on our own land on the grass under 
their nests. Several of their young must 
have perished miserably, and the deserted 
nests look very sad. Still we think enough 
young remain to save the rookery. The 
Florentine yellow Tulips are in bloom. How 
far more lovely to the unhorticultural eye 
are these wild kinds with their graceful 
bending stalks, than those the Tulip's cultiva- 
tion has so well succeeded in stiffening, — 
with all their grand colour ! On the 7th 
appeared, as I knew she would sooner or 



IN A GARDEN. 1 13 



later, the little " Vedova" Iris of Florence. 
Under the south wall, where we did not 
think to seek, there she was, for the first 
time after these eight years' seclusion. And 
still she wears her weeds of green and black. 
The roots have increased and thrown up 
quantities of leaves. These leaves are not 
rounded like those of the Spanish Iris, and 
other long narrow kinds : they are four-sided, 
with sharp angles, very strong, and have a 
sharp point at the end. 




MAY. 



" Pale crocuses have come before 
her. 
Wild birds her welcome sing ; 
Ten thousand loving hearts adore 
her, 
The grey world's darling. Spring." 
W. M. Elton. 




VIII. 
MAY. 



Of Cherry Blossoms — the Nightingale's " melodious 
noise " — Of Broken Stones, etc., etc., etc. 

Alaj' 6. — The month of May would be 
Heaven upon earth if only it came in August 
or September, when summer mostly begins! 
but such cold, hard weather as we have had 
spoils sadly our enjoyment of the blossom 
trees and all the pleasures of spring. There 
have been just one or two sweet days, when 
the white Cherry orchards shone softly 
against a sky of serenest blue, days when 
we did but revel in the joyous present, 
forgetting quite that ever it could be that 
" Rough v/inds do shake the darling buds of 
May." Alas ! all too soon our dream is 



DAYS AND HOURS 



dispelled ; dark clouds arise, and we see 
*' Heaven's gold complexion dimmed," and 
the orchard grass strewn with pearly wreck. 
The Cherry tree's magic season is at an end; 
it seemed to last scarcely longer than a day. 
With the first hot shafts of April's sun it 
startles into bloom shaken out in snow- 
wreaths all over the tree, a waste of most 
lavish loveliness. It is something gained, 
once in the twelvemonths' round of common- 
place, if only for a moment to stand beside 
a Cherry tree in blossom. The blue sky 
looks infinitely far off, seen through such a 
maze of flowery myriads. And now Apple 
blossoms are coming on in rosy swift succes- 
tion. How beautiful they are! and is it not 
time that water-colour artists should cease to 
weary, by attempting so vainly to pourtray 
them ? (This only by the way.) They have 
the merit of lasting just long enough for us to 
enjoy them well ; yet, beautiful as they are, 
I do not know if they can ever quite compare 
with the frail short-lived cherry. If the 
Espaliers in the kitchen garden alongside the 
middle walk would but flower together all at 
once, that walk in May would be better than 



IN A GARDEN. 119 



any picture gallery. But our gallery walls 
perversely decorate themselves only a little 
bit at a time. One bit, at a corner of the 
cross-walks, is now in full perfection. A 
faint delicious perfume steals out through the 
iron gate to the flower garden, inviting as 
one passes by, to turn and peep within. 
There are the trained leafless branches 
covered thick with knots of flower. They 
open very deliberately and there abide for a 
little happy while, self-conscious, round, and 
pink, and firm ; then there comes a setting of 
delicate green around the flowers ; and then, 
the apple tree in bloom is one of earth's 
loveliest sights. Apple-blossom must be 
added to my 'Dharmacopoeia of sweet smells. 
To inhale a cluster of Blenheim Orange gives 
back youth for just half a minute after. It is 
not merely that with the perfume, the heart 
goes back to remembered times, — it is a real, 
absolute elexir ! Our young Siberian Crab- 
trees are like great white bouquets; and 
behind the pigeon-house there is a wonder 
of Japanese Apple (Pyrus Malus floribunda). 
It is like a fountain of flowers, tossing its 
pink flower-laden branches in every direc- 



DAYS AND HOURS 



tion. Blue Periwinkles creep over the 
ground underneath it. In the autumn I shall 
hope to plant several more of these lovely 
trees somewhere on the lawn, where we may 
see and enjoy them from the windows. And 
now the Primrose, 

" Lady of the springe, 
The lovely flower that first doth show her face ; 

Whose worthy prayse the pretty byrds do syng. 
Whose presence sweet the wynter's colde doth chase," 

has ceased to glad us " with worldes of new 
delightes." She is on the wane, "with her 
bells dim" — as old Ben Jonson said ; but I 
should not call them bells. She dies upon a 
bed of vivid green amidst tall grasses and 
her own thick coming leaves, as stars grow 
pale before the dawn. And we are faithless 
to her beauty in the presence of other, fresher 
loveliness; and we care not, though the 
Primrose is dead. 

The Tulips in the parterr — it is the older 
and prettier way to spell it without an " e " 
at the end — are now the chief ornament of 
the garden and the delight of my eyes. 
Timely rains strengthened the stalks to 



IN A GARDEN. 



rise to their full height, and there are the beds 
now, ablaze of scarlet and yellow splendour. 
There are tall tulips and short tulips rose 
and crimson, scarlet and orange tulips, 
striped and dashed and brown and white, 
and every shade of tulip colour. A few grow 
between little box and golden Arbor vitae 
bushes, and all the beds are deeply fringed 
with crocus leaves. I am aware that as a 
matter of the highest principle, Tulips are 
seldom mixed, the colours are usually 
arranged separately. Long experience has 
taught me, however, to have nothing to do 
with principles — in the garden. Little else 
than a feeling of entire sympathy with the 
diverse characters of your plants and flowers 
is needed for '*art in the garden." If sym- 
pathy be there all the rest comes naturally 
enough. No brighter, gayer garden scene 
can be imagined than on a sunny morning, 
turning the corner of a clipped Yew — 
buttressed out from the house — to come upon 
the parterr, decked in all its gay brilliancy of 
tulips. The sculptured stone pillar rises 
from a little mound of Stonecrop in the 
centre, often with a pigeon or a thrush plum- 



DAYS AND HOURS 



ing itself on the top. wSuddenly the little 
flock of fantail pigeons with whistling wings, 
descend among the many-coloured brilliants ; 
and there, in the emerald, dewy interspaces, 
they strut and play in their pride and purity 
of whiteness. My favourite Parrot Tulips do 
not as yet make much way ; the lack of sun- 
shine keeps their buds green. It was in 
Venice, years ago, that first I fell in love 
with Tulips such as these. On the marble 
altars of one of the great Jesuit churches 
were vases filled with Parrot Tulips, all cut- 
edged and gold and scarlet-splashed. The 
cloister garden behind the church was full 
of them. It is a strange disorderly beauty, 
and sometimes draggles and hangs its un- 
tidy head like a bell flower, and sometimes 
flaunts it up full in the sun's face. There 
are Forget-me-nots in many parts of the 
garden : their long smoke-like lines of 
turquoise are specially pleasing. Two 
square beds in the entrance court, set 
between the black Yews, are also a success : 
Forget-me-not, flecked with pink Saponaria; 
— they give the idea of blue mist touched 
by the sunset. In the Fantaisie, bushes of 



IN A GARDEN, 1 23 

orange-coloured Berberis Darwinii are in 
great perfection of bloom. There is some- 
thing peculiarly delightful in the M-ay they 
have of spreading the earth with orange, 
while yet the laden boughs above own no 
apparent loss. The orange colour contrasts 
well also with a chance lot of purple Honesty, 
which has grouped itself round a smooth- 
stemmed young Mulberry at the end of the 
turf walk. The walk itself is very bright, 
with an irregular bordering of white and 
pink Phlox Nelsoni, — a Cheiranthus, or 
a deep blue Gentian, here and there. The 
little low-growing Phlox comes in exquisite 
patches of colour all over the garden. When 
in flower, the plant itself — which is strag- 
gling and rather ugly — is completely hid by 
a flat mass of close -set bloom. In these 
"gardens on a level," I am always wishing 
for rockeries and little low terraces, which 
should be all draped with Convolvulus 
mauristiana. Phlox Nelsoni, Aubretia, and 
wild Ivy and Alyssum, or something yellow. 
I should not much care for many rare Alpine 
plants, I think ; though a surprise of the 
kind here and there would be charming. 



124 DAYS AND HOURS 



Colour I must have, and plenty of it, to 
rejoice the eye and make glad the 
heart. 

A tract of wild savage scenery, six square 
yards in extent, is in contemplation at the 
aiforested end of the Fantaisie. Already 
one or two large pieces of a sort of con- 
glomerate have been conveyed here, and are 
frowning in an open space amongst the wild 
Bluebells. There is a background of dark 
Arbor-vit£e, and beyond, the pleasant fields 
are seen, with the cows and elms and an 
oak tree. There exists a certain necessity 
for feature in this flattest of all places ! The 
Yew hedges and pyramids have done much 
to give character to the flower garden, and 
now there must be rocks for variety. 

A heap of fragments of an old headless 
statue lie near the rocky waste. Part of a 
sitting figure — a hand and a foot — and lumps 
of heavy drapery, over-laid in beautiful green 
velvet of moss. Very forlorn the broken 
stones look, and I cannot decide to make 
them into rockwork. None now know whom 
the statue in its day was meant to represent 
— probably a garden goddess, Flora or Po- 



IN A GARDEN. 



125 



mona — but its history is rather quaint, if not 
touching. It was beloved by a lady who 
lived here once and hated by her sister, 
and, according as each for the time reigned 
in the other's absence, it was set up in a 
niche of the garden wall, or cast down with 
ignominy. At last the sister who loved the 
statue died, and then it was broken to pieces, 
and flung down a well. It was fished up 
again long after, before our time. Tradition 
tells of another statue, an image of Old Time, 
that stood or sat at one end of the pond in 
*' the park," but of this there remains no 
trace. 

I am happy in the possession of two 
long-desired flowers, which seem now to be 
settling down in their new abode. One 
is the pale blue Star Anemone apennina, 
common in the Ilex woods of Frascati ; the 
other, the lovely purplish-brown Fritillary 
(Felleleagris), found wild in river meadows 
near us. Fritillary is no easy word for 
poetry ; yet it is named by at least one 
poet. Matthew Arnold in his "Thyrsis" 
says, — 

" 1 know what white, A\hat purple fritillaries 



126 DAYS AND HOURS 

The grassy harvest of the river-fields, 

Above by Ensham, down by Sandford yields." 

I think no other flower of any kind can 
compare with it in finish and exquisite 
grace of form. The purplish, dove-like 
colour I believe to be the same described 
in old French as "colombette." 

i$th. — To-day, amid the brilliant green of 
new leaves and the singing and twittering of 
a thousand birds in the sun's warm glow, 
one keeps saying to oneself — 

" Spring, tbe sweet sprhig. is the year's pleasant king," 

or some such old snatch, of songs that seem to 
wander upon the soft sweet air. Ah yes 
— ** the year's pleasant king ! " — and yet our 
spring is a beautiful spirit, and she has been 
hovering about us — but now, to-day, she has 
set her feet upon the earth, and there is a 
great triumph of verdure on the trees and on 
the grass; and apple trees meet her in fulness 
of bloom, and May-buds are swelling on the 
Thorns to make up for lost time ; and all 
the edges of meadow-grass are jewelled with 
little gems of purple and blue and red, and 
the broad fields shine in silver and gold. 



IN A GARDEN. 1 27 

The short reign of Narcissus poeticus has 
begun ; our large old clumps down one side 
of the broad walk are not so fine as usual ; 
frosts and cold heavy rains laid the leaves of 
some of them, and sometimes turned them 
yellow ; but within the walled garden the 
clumps are as beautiful as ever — throngs of 
long-stalked silvery flowers, stiff and firm, 
with the stiffness and strength of perfect 
health. Narcissus poeticus is lovely; and 
we need not trouble to know if it be the 
very flower named by Theocritus, Virgil, and 
Ovid. The east border, though not much 
varied as yet, is gay and full of promise. 
There are double pale yellow Ranunculus 
(the Swiss meadow kind), and bunches of 
Heartsease, violet and brown Auriculas, sheets 
of double white Anemones, and the Riviera 
double scarlet, — which, however, never with 
us comes scarlet, but only dull red ; Tulips, 
Stonecrops, Kingspear, Phlox Nelsoni, double 
King's-cups, and Bachelors' Buttons, a patch 
of Gentians at the south angle of the wall, 
with yellow Corydalis lutea peering out of 
chinks in the old bricks above. Crowds of 
Lilies are springing up in the background, with 



128 DAYS AND HOURS 



purple Iris and Pseonies in bud. Solomon's 
Seal (Lady's Signet) in many nooks and 
corners unfolds its curious club-shaped leaf- 
buds, and all its bells will soon be hung. 
Pansies, under the south wall, make a bright 
display ; there are three large oblong beds — 
lilac, yellow, and deep royal purple. Also a 
round bed of semi- double Anemones, whose 
scarlet colour, about mid-day, is actually 
dazzling ; and one of Ranunculus not yet 
opened. Behind these beds against the wall 
are white Irises, almost ready to bloom, and 
several clusters of the garden Star of Beth- 
lehem — valuable in its way, but not nearly 
so pretty as the wild sort, and most precise 
in its daily system of early closing and late 
opening. 

Between the tennis-court and the little 
lawn belonging to the Firs and Cedar, the 
walk winds along beside a close of chosen 
trees — Plane, Silver Birch, pink Thorns, 
variegated Maple, etc., all in their pleasant 
time of youth having been planted only a 
little over eleven years. Portugal Laurel 
and Box mingle with them in deeper shades. 
Next the walk are Sweet Briar and well- 



IN A GARDEN. 129 



berried Auciibas ; one Aucubais still covered 
with scarlet fruit and golden leaves. There 
is yellow Spanish Broom, and tall trees of 
white Broom wave long white plumes, lean- 
ing over the path. White Broom, they say, 
is "the Juniper tree" that Elijah sat down 
under. If so, the shade must have been but 
scanty ! Soon the path turns past a Yew 
tree, and becomes the Primrose walk, along 
under the line of Elms. 

On the left are the allee verte, and the 
dovecote, and small orchard, bounded by 
Beech and Yew, and crossed by flower- 
bordered smooth-shaven grassy ways, all 
leading to the Broad Walk ; on the right a 
little hidden path passes on to the oft-named 
Fantaisie. Just before coming to the Yew- 
tree, on warm days ever since the beginning 
of the month, one is met and surrounded by 
a wonderful cloud of fragrance ! One looks 
round in vain for some bed of flowers whence 
should proceed so powerful a scent. It is 
like the finest Jasmine and Citron, and I 
know not what of sweetest unknown incense. 
It is the greeting sent out from a dense mass 
of spurge Laurel (Daphne pontifia) with un- 

9 



130 



DAYS AND HOURS 



obtrusive green flowers in full bloom. It 
grows over a bit of the Iris bank, and its 
great luxuriance proves how it loves a 
southern aspect. 

In our garden the birds have divided the 
kingdom amongst them., and in this half is 
the portion that fell to the reed sparrow. 
He keeps the Silver Birch alive with his 
busy note. Landmarks, known only to 
themselves, divide the territory of the reed 
sparrow from the realm of the nightingale. 
I'he fiery-hearted nightingale ! He sings all 
day, and his song makes the night glorious. 
The north-east region of the garden he keeps 
for himself alone. There, on still evenings 
long after sunset, is heard the faint barking 
of distant watch dogs, or the sound of horses' 
hoofs on the road. There is his favourite 
tree — the grand old Thorn — where, as he 
sings, he may press a thousand thorns into 
his breast ! There, across the hedge, he sees 
the meadow with a shimmering yellow of 
Cowslips all over it — if Cowslips be his 
desire, as is said. There, not too far off, is 
the straight long railroad — and he loves the 
thunder of the train, and the red, fire-spitting 



IN A GARDEN. 131 

engine. But late in the night, when there is 
dark and deathlike silence among the trees, 
then the nightingale claims possession of the 
whole, and all the garden is his own. I 
know not if the nightingale's song be 
melancholy or joyous. His voice has all 
the pathos of the finest things ; and in the 
broken notes, we feel that not all nor half 
his soul is uttered, and in each splendid 
fragment there is the sense of endless pos- 
sibilities ; this, I think, is the secret of the 
nightingale's incomparable charm. 

I have omitted to mention amongst our 
Pansies, a very choice kind. It is a curious 
burnt-brown colour, like the once fashionable 
" Paris brule." We name it Highcliff, after 
the place from whence we had it first. Two 
large pink Oleanders in the greenhouse will 
soon be blossoming all over. We tried them 
last year in the open air, but they did not 
do, and had to return to their glass. A 
lovely face gazes at me all the time I write, 
and will not sufi'er itself to be neglected ! 
It is a choice white Cactus of great size, 
with w^arm lemon colouring in the oqter 
leaves. The stamens are so delicately set, 



132 DAYS AND HOURS IN A GARDEN. 



they tremble at the slightest touch, and the 
starry pointal is itself a flower ! 




rUNE. 



A Mosaic of Nectared Sweets. 




IX. 

JUNE. 

Of Pink May — Swallows in the Porch — Flowers de Luce 
— Poppies — A Little Scotch Rose, and " Clutie." 

June 6. — It is difficult to know what to say- 
about the garden in June ! There is so much 
to say, I can hardly tell how to begin. The 
leafy month earns well its title, so grandly 
full-leaved are the trees ; in finer leaf I think, 
than they have been for many a year. The 
Elms stand out against the sky in rounded 
blocks of green, and in the Lime avenue the 
broad leaves meeting overhead are round 
and pure in outline, untouched as yet by 
destroying worms, untorn by tempests. The 
young Horse Chestnuts along the little water- 
course are nearly twice the size they were 



136 DAYS AND HOURS 

last summer, when cruel winds had left them 
only a few ragged discoloured leaves. The 
flower-spikes of a Chestnut within the garden 
measure near a foot in length. The great red 
Horse Chestnut (Pavias Rubra) is red all 
over ; it is a mass of blossom almost from the 
ground upwards to the very top. The tree 
is a fine sight, and if it were not so common 
one scarcely should tire of admiring it. The 
season makes a great difiference in the colour- 
ing of the blossoms. Sometimes they come 
out almost yellow from too little sun and too 
much rain; but in the r\c\i floraison of to-day 
their colour is almost crimson. Then the 
Thorns are in great perfection ; the branches 
of double Pink May can be compared to 
nothing else but bars of pink velvet. The 
double scarlet varieties are finer than 
usual, and under the hot sun their vivid 
colour is quite dazzling. We find this sort 
rather capricious ; some years there is 
more green than red, and when the trees 
were younger the red was finer. A little 
single Thorn, draped itself down to the very 
grass in scarlet bloom ; but it lasts so brief 
a time that every petal now has fallen. It is a 



IN A GARDEN. 1 37 

picturesque, delightful tendency in all trees, 
to bend and stretch out to meet each other ; 
their branches love to touch and interlace. 
So, at this time, across many of our green gar- 
den walks the flowering May makes beautiful 
red-garlanded arches. Pink May and La- 
burnum interweave their branches, and in 
another place a Cherry and a Thorn have 
succeeded in meeting. A little further on, 
an Apple reaches out long arms above the 
turf to touch a copper Beech. Here, in this 
corner, there is also Laurel ; and Brake 
Fern springing of itself, will soon be tall 
enough to reach almost the Apple branches. 
The Beeches on either side the allee verte, 
embower the walk, while along the outmost 
line their slender drooping shoots stretch 
themselves to meet and embrace more staid 
and slow young Elm branchlets, spreading 
from the great old trees. The nightingale's 
old White Thorn shone white like a great 
snow mountain for about ten days, surpass- 
ing all the rest in beauty ; and not far from 
it, deep in a thorny thicket of Dewberry 
mixed with Ivy and Nettles, we found the 
nightingale's nest. I often visited her, and 



138 DAYS AND HOURS 

she would lie close, with head laid back, and 
bright, black, watchful eye, fixed full upon 
me ; but I never her saw strange, smoked 
eggs, because she would never stir from the 
nest. Massive gleams — if such an anomaly- 
can be said — of yellow Spanish and English 
Broom, are shining between green trees, in 
contrast with paler gold of overhanging 
Laburnum. I wonder if the Riviera Broom 
would live in this climate } I mean the 
Broom that grows something like a Rush, 
with the flowers set all down its polished 
stem.* In the orchard border, an immense 
luxuriantly rounded bush of Weigela re- 
places the Pyrus of last month, the lovely 
pink of its blossom set off by the tender 
green around it. These are all beautiful 
bits of colour, and yet they are only 
samples as it were, of what I wish and 
may partly hope for some day ; for a 
Laburnum colonnade is in contemplation, 
and lilac closes, and golden cloisters of 
Genista, some day, there must be ! Some- 
thing also should be made of the pale hang- 



Spartium junceum. 



IN A GARDEN. 1 39 

ing clusters of Wistaria — a pergola ceiled 
in with its lilac pendants, or small bushes 
standing alone, in some grassy place. Our 
Rhododendrons and Azaleas are in great 
beauty, and since last year, are grown and 
filled out ; the season seems in some way to 
have pleased them well. We do not attempt 
fine sorts, though there is just a sprinkling 
of crimson and white and a few others, 
amongst the showy old pinkish-lilac sort. 
The broad border by the side of the 
walk along the Holly hedge, is filled with 
Rhododendrons and Azaleas ; as yet only 
the common — yet always beautiful — yellow 
and creamy- w'hite Azalea, filling all the air 
with its peculiar scent. The success of this 
border is especially pleasant, for the young 
Americans made one rather nervous at times 
during the early spring — on days when the 
weather did not exactly suit them they would 
look so pitiable and dejected, with their 
leaves hanging straight down. Into this 
border were moved most of the aged drawn- 
up Rhododendrons, that used to crowd the 
shrubberies. Here, with more room, they 
have begun to bush out healthily. Yet there 



I40 DAYS AND HOURS 

is at present no peat or made-up bed, and the 
ground is flooded every winter. We think 
of giving them a few cartloads of peat next 
autumn, just by way of encouragement. In 
another year this walk will deserve to be 
called **the Rhododendron walk." At the 
back of the border two double scarlet May 
trees are now radiant with blossom. About 
three years ago they were removed here out 
of the garden, where for some reason they 
had become sickly and had ceased to bloom. 
Change of air and scene has worked 
wonders : they have increased greatly in size, 
and the move is apparently forgotten. Be- 
yond these is the new orchard, deep in grow- 
ing grass, and then the Larch walk ; and — 
and then — palings, if the truth must out! 
Beyond the Holly hedge, in the shrubbery, 
wherein we stuif everything that has nowhere 
else to go, there is at this moment a white 
glory of snow-balled Gueldres Rose. In my 
ideal garden, there shall be large single trees 
of Gueldres Rose standing alone ; not, as 
they generally are grown, " smored up " with 
crowded shrubs. 

But we have wandered far away from the 



IN A GARDEN. 



141 



beloved garden. Over the south porch is the 
Lady's Bower — the chamber always so called 
in old English houses — with Vine-wreathed 
windows. Swallows are building in the 
Garden Porch. It is the chimney swallow, 
with the red throat. Their confidence and 
tameness, the perpetual darting in and out 
of blue-black wings (like tenderly domesti- 
cated trout ! as Mr. Ruskin says), and the 
conversational cheery twitter that goes on 
all day long, are a continual feast. South, 
north, and east are the three porches of the 
house, and swallows in all three. At the 
north they are more bold, but somehow 
less familiar. Darting shoals of swallows 
dash in and out, through the open doors 
into the house, and two nests are now nearly 
built. The family motto, " God's Providence 
is my inheritance," written round the porch 
walls, suits well such a place of birds ; while 
the footless martin — sign of the seventh son — 
borne on the stone shield overthe dooramong 
the Roses and Ivy, our Swallows may also 
feel to be not wholly inappropriate. Under 
the East porch, which is now green with 
Virginian creeper and Vine — and which 



142 DAYS AND HOURS 

will be in its season purple with Clematis, a 
pair of swallows are arranging a settlement. 
Here also, though not quite so welcome, no 
one dreams of denying them. After the sun 
has turned the corner of the house, this porch 
is cool and shady. On the threshold is set 
the legend, Nos et meditemur in horto^ taken 
from a sundial in the nun's garden at Poles- 
worth near Tamworth. The invitation, I 
think is generally disregarded. Many cross 
that threshold to walk in the garden and 
admire the flowers, or to play tennis, or 
perhaps — to smoke. But I do not think 
people often meditate much in the garden 
in these days. Dogs do sometimes, as they 
sit in the sun. But I wonder how it is done ! 
From the south front a lot of Everlasting 
Pea has wound itself round between the 
wall and the Yew buttress, taking up fully 
one half of the porch. It is well named 
Everlasting ! One has nothing to do but to 
dig it up, and cut and hack it away, and the 
next year it will appear strong and hearty 
and in double quantity. It takes no hint that 
there may be too much of a good thing!. 
And yet, when it looks so fresh and hand- 



IN A GARDEN. 1 43 

some, with its large bright flowers, it would 
be cruel to wish it away. So let it be, to 
teach its lesson and to smother as it will. 
The white Irises are nearly over, and wood 
Strawberries begin to redden under the 
windows. An old Maiden's Blush Rose, 
covered with buds, peeps in at the dining- 
room window on one side, and on the 
other is the lovely pink of a most perfect 
Moss Rose. The parterr in front of the 
window is bedded out, of course. I know 
that it soon will be a blaze of well-chosen 
colour ; but excepting the golden mount of 
Stonecrop in the centre, I do not take much 
personal interest in its summer phase. It 
is fortunate for the garden's character that 
this should be so ; for as the invention of 
new combinations of plants and colours would 
be to me impossible, this is left always in 
our Gardener's hands with full confidence 
that the result will be as perfect as such 
things can be. From the dining-room win- 
dow, we can also see between the Sumac 
and a Box-tree, near where a Paeony showers 
crimson on the daisies, a tiny mound of turf. 
It has been there since the end of last month ; 



144 DAYS AND HOURS 

and under it lies the dear little favourite 
of nine summers — Clutie, the little black 
Skye terrier. She always loved the Dining- 
room ! . . . We can now almost walk all 
round the garden in deep cool shade, such 
growth the trees have made ! The Broad 
Walk must always be exposed to the sun ; 
but from the west of it, across the lawn where 
the old bowling green once was, the distance 
from shade to shade lessens year by year 
as the trees grow on. There is a charming 
well-shaded welt along the grass, of purple 
Pansies and white Pinks, in two thick lines ; 
and on the sunny side a very bright dash of 
Limnanthes Douglasii has made a self-sown 
edging. As if it enjoyed the pleasant cool- 
ness of a north-west border, one lovely 
double Narcissus still lingers on in her 
early freshness. When hot sunbeams 
pierce the shade, every day I think must 
be her last. The Spurge Laurel has re- 
lapsed into the plain dulness of its summer 
state, but the Iris bank upon which it grows 
is as lovely as heart can desire. Cedar and 
Copper Beech and one or two Firs, cast light 
shadows upon the company of Irises, and help 



IN A GARDEN. 145 

them not to wither up too quickly. The pre- 
vailing hue is lilac, with stronger tones, and 
yellows intermixed. Each one in turn seems 
loveliest, but one chief beauty (/m Pallida) 
has broad petals of soft grey, most delicately 
flushed with pink. Then there are lilacs 
marked with deeper lines and white with 
lilac edges {Iris Aphylla), finely pencilled ; 
Enchantress, and several other yellow 
Variegatas, with lines of red or brown 
pale yellow, with the three outer petals 
intense velvety-purple ; and one, pale bluish 
with deep blue- purple velvet outside, and 
bright yellow brush, well marked. These 
two are much better than gay Darius, or the 
handsome sullen Versailles. The sober old 
Marquise {Iris Lurida), too — who is, how- 
ever, more like Mrs. Delany in dove-coloured 
mode silk hood ! — after long delay, is there 
amongst the best. Does any plant exist that 
loves not a corner or an edge ? — I think not 
one ; so a little corner here, where a narrow 
grass path crosses the Iris, bank into the 
Beechen close, is made especially lovely by 
the undesigned grouping of three Irises en- 
riched by a background of green Ferns and 

10 



146 DAYS AND HOURS 

Beech. The centre of the group is a deep 
red-purple Iris (from Vesuvius), a finely- 
coloured yellow and purple, and between 
them a pure white. These grow tall and 
stately from out their straight stiff leaves, 
while a little Welsh Poppy established there 
by chance, brings in its crumpled lemon-gold 
with the happiest effect. Colour effects, 
wherever they appear in our garden, are 
seldom planned. Somehow it does not 
come naturally to think, " Here there shall 
be blue Larkspur and white Lilies," or there 
red Poppies and something else. But it is 
quite an exquisite delight to find the most 
beautiful accidents of colour in unexpected 
places all about the garden. Then these 
chances may give hints, which we can take 
or not. At a corner behind the dovecote 
there is a grand crimson Pseony, mixed up 
with brilliant orange Marigolds, some of them 
black-eyed ; — red and yellow are splendid, 
if well used. Against the dark brown of a 
Cryptomeria elegans stands a tall Tulip, like 
white china painted and streaked blood-red ; 
at least it is over now, but I see it all the 
same. Then there is a patch of Welsh 



IN A GARDEN. 1 47 

Poppy growing just as one finds a patch 
of Gentian, or white Crocus, on the Alps — 
and with it London Pride, a mass of feathery 
red, growing in the same way. Under the 
trees, one meets a pallid Columbine looking 
like a ghost, and just by chance in the lilac 
Iris bed, occurs one rich carmine Rose. 
I do not even think the delicately refined 
colour combination of dwarf growing Gloire 
de Dijon Roses and bronze Heartsease 
w^as quite intentional ; they mix, however, 
strangely well. And the bed of pink Roses 
— Prevost and Jules Margottin, — with the 
white Pink, Mrs. Sinkms, promises to be 
an equal success. 

One would fain stay for awhile the steps 
of the summer fiow^ers in the garden ; but 
these bright daughters of the year, in long 
procession flit by more swiftly as each new 
day arises. They are in such a hurry now 
to come and to be gone, alas ! Even at this 
very moment there are signs of the quick 
approach of some of our latest loves. For in 
the east border among crimson Paeonies and 
lingering purple Iris, appears already a 
single Dahlia ! In such a multitude one 



148 DAYS AND HOURS 



hardly knows which flowers to note, they are 
all so fair. But in the " Fantaisie," — I think 
I could almost let the Roses go which are 
bursting into bloom as bushes and as pillar 
Roses, — ^just to keep it a little longer as it is 
now, with the hosts of White Fox-gloves, 
with double white Rockets, yellow Day Lily 
and puce-purple Columbines ; Irises and 
white stars of Nicotiana rising over an 
edging of pink and white Phlox Nelsoni, — 
all these and many more set oft' by Cupressus 
and Fir, interspersed among the flowers 
beyond ; and flaring across the grass walk, 
a great fiery scarlet oriental Poppy. With 
the morning shining through it this flower 
seems made up of fire from the sun itself — 
the very purest possible essence of scarlet. 
Several magnificent Poppies light up the 
garden at diff"erent points. Their scarlet 
is a fast colour, neither wind nor sun 
will scorch or change it in the least, and 
in this quality it is superior to so many 
flowers whose colours fly directly — some 
more easily than others. The brown Hearts- 
ease cannot stand the sun, while the large 
purple is unmoved. The crimson of the 



IN A GARDEN. 149 



Paeony flies ; and the rose-red double Pyre- 
thrum scorches quickly. Lilac (excepting 
in Wistaria) seems one of the fastest colours 
in the garden ! — though raindrops standingall 
night in a half-faded lilac Iris become a most 
beautiful colour ! Although it seems that 
scarlet, yellows, and colours in which blue 
is mixed stand best. Besides the great 
scarlet Poppies, the annual Poppies are com- 
ing on in all their varied pinks and reds and 
whites ; their large crumpled petals have 
the shape and all the transparent delicacy of 
rare sea shells. There is also a charming 
uncertainty as to the colours, or amount of 
doubleness to be expected. Amongst the 
best are bright reds with a clear white eye, 
and pink- hemmed whites. But whenever 
anything approaching a common field Poppy 
makes its appearance amongst them — as often 
happens, they have such a strong tendency to 
run back — it has to be pulled up immediately. 
Our Columbines are not so fine as they were 
last summer ; their flowers are smaller and 
not so free in form. The Californian scarlet 
and yellow, is so small as to be a miniature of 
itself. There is, however, one fine plant with 



I50 DAYS AND HOURS 

flowers pale violet and primrose, and the vari- 
ous tints of " crushed strawberry " are very 
lovely, especially in the double Columbines. 

15M. — Here is the middle of the month, 
and the garden is more bewildering than 
ever! Rosebuds in countless multitudes 
are blooming everywhere in every part. 
And as the fashion is to call her so, we must 
allow the Rose to be queen of flowers ; and 
since it is most true that Roses are 

"Not royal in their smells alone, but in their hue," 

so, though my beloved Iris has not yet faded 
from the garden, the Rose now must be 
worshipped. One by one we have already 
greeted many of our old best favourites. 
Amongst them Boursault came first, climbing 
the south gables of the house ; then Souvenir 
d'un Ami, large and full flushed, at the very 
top of the long bare old stem of a climber, 
any age ; then Gloire de Dijon, which 
though even more profuse in its bloom than 
usual, has a something not quite right about 
it this year — a sort of old expression. After 
that, Maiden's Blush and Moss Rose. A 
great wild bush of Boursault rose grows 



IN A GARDEN. I 5 I 



at the north end of the garden— the flowers 
are lovely, recalling a little in their colour 
and irregular shape what I remember 
as "the Musk Rose," in the gardens of 
former days. Coupe d'Hebe, on the wall of 
the gardener's cottage, is perfect in scent 
and shape and in true rose-colour. The 
yellow Briar is finer than usual, and Damask 
Roses are opening fast. La France too— 
the Rose whose scent is made of the finest 
attar— has delighted us with half-a-dozen 
beautiful blooms; BlairiiNo. 2, begins to 
crest the wire arches (one never hears of No. 
I !). But among the Rose joys which abound 
already or that we still expect in endless 
succession, none are so dear to me as one 
little ragged bush covered now with small 
white Scotch Roses of exquisite perfume. 
This little Rose bush is forty-eight years old, 
to my certain knowledge. It was planted by 
my father, and it has been mine for the last 
twenty years. Last year it showed some 
signs of feebleness, so we moved it from the 
over-crowded place where it had been for 
eleven years, into a newly-made bed with a 
south aspect. There, with a companion of 



152 DAYS AND HOURS IN A GARDEN. 

the same kind it promises to take a new 
lease of life. Strange that such a little Rose 
should thus live on for well-nigh half a cen- 
tury, calmly putting forth its leaf and bloom 
summer after summer, whilst so many of the 
men and women who knew it once have 
passed away! It somehow makes one think 
of the old monk pointing to the frescoes on 
his convent walls, and saying, "These are 
the realities, we are the shadows. 

A word of praise must be said for the blue 
and green of Anchusa italica at the southern 
end of the broad walk, and the beds of 
white Pinks (these are the old-fashioned 
"maiden pinks of odour faint"), mixing 
their perfume deliciously with Musk. The 
beds and large patches of beautiful " Mrs. 
Sinkins " are very good this season. They 
are, as Bacon would say, " fast flowers of 
their smell," in flavour like Clove Carnations. 




JULY, 



" As the last taste of sweet is sweetest 
last. 
Writ in remembrance more than 
things long past." 

Shakespeare. 




MIDSUMMER AND JULY. 



Of Paeonies- 



-Iris Sibirica — Green Peas — Fennel — Straw- 
berries — Lilies— The Vine. 



June 24. — " Ere the parting hour go by, quick, 
thy tablets, jMemory." In less than a week 
July will be here, and June will fade away 
into the past and be forgotten, while more 
than half its loveliness is still unnoted and 
untold. So here on Midsummer night, when 
the spirits of earth and air have power, let 
me call back for a moment the dear-worth 
vision of flowers that were my delight in 
the gone sweet days of early June. I would 
try also to fix the remembrance of a few, 
out of the thousand glories of the day, 
doomed to die before ever the story of next 



56 DAYS AND HOURS 



month begins. And first the Paeonies, which 
I have as yet scarcely named. Earliest of 
all came the crimson-pink single Paeony 
{PcEonia Peregrina), with yellow stamens and 
bluish leaves, like a giant Rose of Sharon 
(the single red Scotch Rose) ; then the 
pale pink double ; then the heavy crimson, 
that pales so quick in sun or rain ; then, 
most beautiful of all, the pure, cold, white 
Paeony, with a faint tinge of colour on its 
outer petals. Last of all, the large rose- 
red — rose-coloured with an evanescent per- 
fume like a dream of the smell of a wild 
Rose, yet in substance so staunch a 
flower, that I have known rose Paeonies 
retain their beauty for two full weeks in a 
glass of water. All these, excepting one or 
two who here and there outstay the rest, 
are gone by. 

And then the Elder! The hedgerows 
have been white with it ; and there were 
days when all the air was scented with it, 
and the country smelt of Elder ! The path 
under our one tree is now a milky way, 
covered with a myriad little fallen stars. 
They remind one of the far-away Olives' 



IN A GARDEN. 1 57 

Starry blossoms, when they fall softly among 
Lady Tulips and Gladioli in ]\Iay. Syringa 
[Philadelphtis, or mock orange) has come and 
almost gone ; three varieties — the old small 
one, the large-flowered, and the half-double 
sort. I like most the first, and this has also 
the most powerful scent. A large old bush 
of it grows in the grass, just without the glass 
door in the wall opening into the green- 
house. Dear Syringa ! best hated and best 
loved of flowers. The lovers of it hail its 
blooming with enthusiasm, and break off 
sprigs to wear as they pass the bush, whilst 
others will go the other way round to avoid 
passing near. And now it suffers still 
further insult by being denied its own old 
name, Syringa! Even in 1597, in Gerarde's 
time, there began to arise some confusion 
between it and the Lilac, or "Blew Pipe Tree." 
And now, at this very time, has come 
a new burst of Irises — the narrow-leaved 
kinds. Not the real Spanish Irises ; their 
time is not yet. We have a few old plants 
whose flowers are deep bronze, flame- 
centred, in yellow gold, and a stronger, 
commoner kind of full lilac colour. One 



158 DAYS AND HOURS 



little plant, growing in a pet corner by the 
iron gate in the south wall, has a delicate 
primrose and lilac-tipped bloom. And there 
is the great white Flag Iris, whose grand 
leaves stand four feet high. The right 
place has not yet been found for this fine 
plant. For three years past he has just 
borne with us, and no more ; I fear he 
dislikes us, — and he shows it. By the 
watercourse the yellow Flags are as yellow 
as possible, in rich contrast with their 
dark green leaves ; and in the *' Fantaisie," 
where the China 1 ulip stood last month, — 
showing bright against the dusky Crypto- 
meria elegans, is now a fine root of Iris 
Sibirica alba. The blue Sibirica is good, but 
this white variety is most lovely. One could 
not pass it by without remarking the peculiar 
whiteness of its small shapely flowers set 
on such long slender stalks. How wonder- 
ful are the contrasts of white in flowers ! 
Of those now in bloom together, one hardly 
knows which to call the whitest of them 
all. This little Iris retains through its 
whiteness a dim remembrance, as it were, 
of blue. 



IN A GAI^DEN. 



59 



There is the kitchen garden too ! The 
fresh and brilliant beauty that just now 
it holds within its walls, will soon be past, 
giving place to richer more sober colours. 
Looking through the old ironwork of the 
gate, up the straight middle walk, there is 
such a splendour of brightly blended colour 
in the flowers on either side ! As yet, they 
are in their prime ; the keynote of colour 
is white — double Rockets, double white 
Pyrethrums and white Pinks. Then, bend- 
ing down over the walk, mixing in with 
the whiteness, glowing through leaf and 
branch in brilliant intervals of colour, are 
Roses — pink, crimson, blush ; Annual 
Poppies, tender or dazzling in their hue ; 
clouds of pale blue Delphinium with spires 
of deepening blue over-topping all the rest. 
Just midway between the pink and crimson 
Roses, a Briar wreathed about with small 
yellow blooms hangs over the cross walks 
at the corner. Masses of low blue Campa- 
nula fill in below or between the larger 
flowers. Right at the end, another iron 
gate lets in the glimmering of cool shades 
beyond. A little wren's nest is there, 



l6o DAYS AND HOURS 

ensconced snugly in a bowery Clematis, 
halfway up the pillar; the nest cannot be 
seen so far off — but I know well how the 
small entrance hole is quite filled up with 
greedy little yellow beaks and gaping mouths ! 
The little mother is hard at work for them, 
somewhere near — hunting the bark of an 
Elm, most likely. The golden wrens 
have brought out their families — two nestfuls. 
We found the nests hanging in the Yews, 
and now the garden seems to be full of 
little elfin scissors' grinders, busy all day 
long. 

I have a fancy to open the gate and go all 
round the kitchen garden quite prosaically. 
The other garden will seem still sweeter, 
after. Here, on the left, is a breadth of 
wonderful Lettuces, round and close like 
small round Cabbages with milk-white 
middles ; and beyond, some taller and 
tied-up — more like salad. Near the Lettuces 
are tall ranks of Peas, hung all over with 
well-filled pods. I think I like these beau- 
tiful green Peas, growing here, as much as 
when served up in a dish for dinner. There 
seems always to be something attractive to 



IN A GARDEN. l6l 

Art of all kinds in pea pods ; from the pods 
sculptured on the great bronze gates of the 
cathedral at Pisa, or the raised needlework 
of the sixteenth century, to the ornaments 
in the jewellers' shops of Paris or the 
portraits of Marrowfats or Telegraph Pea 
in the advertisement sheets of gardening 
papers. These last being really pictures, 
though not meant so. I remember once 
being shown a white satin spencer of Queen 
Elizabeth's, embroidered in butterflies and 
Green Pea pods half open to show the 
rows of peas within. 

I think there is Beet-root, and a fine lot of 
30ung cabbages, beyond the Peas— in which 
no one can feel any particular interest ; and 
oh ! such a sweet patch of seedling Mrs. 
Sinkins white Pink. I wish that Pink did 
possess a more poetical name — Arethusa 
or Boule de Neige I but the thing is done, 
and to the end of time Mrs. wSinkins will be 
herself. Next comes a little square of 
Japanese Iris, the tall stems tipped with 
swelling buds whose grand unfolding I long 
to see. Rows of young Sage plants grow 
near, quite unlike sage-green, so called, in 

I J 



I 62 DAYS AND HOURS 

colour ; and a nice little plantation of healthy- 
looking Fennel. That is for broiled mackerel : 
but there is to me another interest connected 
with Fennel that lies in a lurking hope, 
always unfulfilled, of finding upon it a 
caterpillar of the rare Papilio regina. 
Caterpillars of another sort are only too 
multitudinous on the Currants growing 
up the walls. The increase of them, and 
of the sawflies belonging to them, is not 
short of miraculous. One may stamp out 
whole families and clear the bushes, and 
next morning they will be beginning again. 
Yet invariably in the act of destroying 
there creeps in a sort of questioning, whether 
the caterpillars have not full as good a right 
to the Currants as we have ; except indeed, 
that we and not they planted them. But 
the sawflies would seem to have at least a 
right to live — a greater right perhaps than we 
to have tarts ; yet they are spared none the 
more for such-like uncomfortable reflections. 
On the south wall the fruit trees seem to be 
more or less flourishing. An old Nectarine 
is covered with fruit. Then comes Apricot 
tree No. i, on which I find no Apricots; 



IN A GARDEN. 163 



Nos. 2 and 3 the same, 4 dead, and 5 with 
"a good few" on it. Then we come 
to Peaches : plenty of them. Then a beau- 
tiful dark-leaved Fig tree, and then the 
Cherries, well fruited and well netted. And 
so on round the walls. Near the wren's 
nest there is another large patch of Pinks 
commoner and better than any, with the 
neatest lacing of purple-madder or lake. 
And here a powerful fragrance stops one 
short ; it is the strawberries, smelling deli- 
ciously. They are littered down with clean 
straw, and netted close for the discomfiture 
of blackbirds. The scent takes me back a 
very long way — back to an inconceivable 
time, when this old smell of Strawberries 
borne across the hedge in the hot noontide 
of some summer holiday, was reason enough 
to set us will vagrants of the garden 
scrambling through the thorns to seize the 
exquisite delight of spoiling our neighbour's 
Strawberries — a joy that was never marred, 
for we were never found out. Sun and rain 
have both been kind, and this is our second 
week of immense red Presidents, one of 
the oldest a.nd best of strawberries — the 



164 DAYS AND HOURS 

older Caroline being now quite forgotten. 
The espaliers are showing plenty of Apples 
and Pears. Three Pear trees standing at the 
four cross- ways, are curiously in bloorn ; 
the blossoms are all sickly-looking and 
undersized, but the trees are covered with 
them up to the very top while fruit is set 
at the same time. I dislike this unnatural 
blooming, for the mind will persist in revert- 
ing to foolish sayings and superstitions 
connected with trees bearing fruit and flower 
at the same time, 

Among the pleasant sights of this mid- 
summer-tide, perhaps the pleasantest of all 
is the great thicket of wild Roses growing 
within the wire network that bounds the 
tennis-lawn on the garden side. The east 
shining full upon it every morning, brings 
forth hundreds of new-blown Roses. Very 
often as you pass into their sweet presence 
from under the Plane trees, the air is redolent 
of a subtle perfume — not always, though, nor 
every day, for Roses are capricious of their 
scent. The yellow-stamened centre of each 
flower glows like a tiny lamp of gold, and 
the soft petals surrounding it are rose-pink of 



IN A GARDEN. i 65 

the tenderest dye. Were these the canker- 
blooms of Shakespeare ? If so, and if in 
his day they could be said to " live unwooed, 
and unrespected die," surely now the tide 
has turned, for the wild Rose is beloved of 
all ; while we must confess that garden Roses 
now-a-days do not always *' die sweet 
deaths." 

July 22. — 

" It is not growing like a tree 

In bulk that makes man better be, 
The Lily of a day 
Is fairer far in May : 
Although it fall and die that night, 
It was the plant and flower of light." 

Ben Jonson. 

Once more, our favourite old Ben ! Roses 
are gone, and ;he memory of them is as 
of something too beautiful for words. And 
Lilies, too, are over; the fairest of them, 
the tall white Lily, with her shining head 
— nil candidius — pure as the shining robe 
of saints in heaven — better than Solomon 
in his glory. She, too, is past ; nothing of 
her remains but long dismal stems with 
down-hanging shrivelled leaves and melan- 



I 66 DAYS AND HOURS 

choly pointals undrest of beauty — to tell of 
her former pride. 

The character and features of the Lily 
would seem to be well marked enough ; 
and yet, sometimes, the popular idea of 
it is certainly a mixed one. In former days, 
flower-hawkers in the streets of London may 
be remembered crying, " Lilies, fine white 
Lilies ! " with their barrow-loads of white 
Thorn, or May blossom, from the country. 
Some botanical reason there must have been 
for the Lilies in Ferrariis De Florum Cultura 
(1633) being named Narcissus ! I have been 
studying an odd volume of this curious old 
book; and the unmistakable Lilies repre- 
sented in the plates are all ** Narcissus 
Indicus." Even the Water-lily-like Blood 
Flower, is a Narcissus. Very likely these 
remarks may only show my ignorance. 

July must be all retrospect, for all is over 
— or so it seems to me. After an absence 
of a few days, on returning to the garden, 
I find there is a change ; an almost autumnal 
feeling in the air, and withered leaves are 
blown across the lawn. Faint perfumes 
linger still about the Limes, and though 



IN A GARDEN. 167 



no song birds are there, the sound of bees 
is heard in the green depths above. But 
we no longer would breakfast under the 
Limes as we did so short a while since, in 
summer days departed. Wind and rain have 
done their worst amongst the flowers, and 
yet there is consolation in all that remains. 
The best are passed away, but beautiful 
new things are coming on. The Evening 
Primrose (^Enothera) already lights up the 
garden ways. Variegated Maples, with their 
foliage white as ivory, look their best against 
the darkening Elms.*' The hedge of Sweet 
Peas is for the moment m beauty. Sweet 
Peas go off too quickly in our light warm 
soil, so we try to prolong their blooming to 
the latest limit by cutting off their pods as 
fast as they appear. 

Purple draperies of Clematis (Virgin's 
Bower) in many shades from the deepest 
violet softening into grey, make the old brick 
walls beautiful ; or the same Clematis droops 



* A small branchlet in one of these white Maples 
has retxirned to the original green, and this is also 
the sole bit of the tree that bears a bunch of keys. 



1 68 DAYS AND HOURS 



from trellises, or clambers up the trees in 
many parts of the garden. Almost always it 
so happens that the tender green of Vines 
mingles with the purple. There is some- 
thing almost unpleasing in the arrangement 
of the four petals of Clematis Jackmanni ! 
but much must be forgiven for the sake 
of such grand colouring. No climbing plant 
comes near the Vine perhaps, in perfect grace 
and beauty of line. The fruitful Vine gives 
delight to the eye in far larger measure than 
Virginia Creeper, or any other of our green 
hangings upon the walls of a house. The 
Vine is more obedient and yet more free, 
and its intelligence is greater. Thinking of 
the Vine as of a person, one would say that 
her foliage shows all the variety of genius. 
Scarcely will you find two leaves alike in 
shape or size or colour. The youngest 
leaves are half transparent and golden-green, 
or reddened by the sun : on some the light 
lies cold and grey. If the Vine is trained 
round the window, the leaves seen from 
within out-spread against the light glow 
like green fires. The very shadiest recesses 
of the Vine are full of light. And then the 



IN A GARDEN. 169 

tenderness and strength of her slender beau- 
tiful tendrils ! How they reach out like 
sentient hands ! And when they have found, 
how strong and firm their clasp ! Then, 
who does not know and love the curious 
aroma of her small green flowers, bringing 
back to memory the smell of a Southern 
vineyard ? Very soon now, autumn suns 
will swell the clustered fruit, and purple 
bloom will begin to show between the leaves. 
A Vine is one of the only plants whose every 
leaf well nigh, may be painted with care in 
a picture and yet not seem too much made 
out. Yet rarely indeed, can human hand 
give the fine thinness and yielding texture 
of a Vine leaf! 

We are never without Portulaca and 
Mesembryanthemum (how far more simple 
is the old name — Fig marigold) about this 
time, and the two beds of them now flower- 
ing, are especially brilliant. Cool colours 
tell beside the scarlet and orange that mostly 
prevail, and in this way nothing could be 
more refreshing than the dwarf Ageratum 
and blue Lobelia, mixed with honey-scented 
Koniga maritima variegata, near the Carna- 



1 70 DAYS AND HOURS IN A GARDEN. 



tions and Portulaca. The deep blue, with 
bronze foliage, of the Lobelia beds in the 
parterr is almost hot beside the cooler blues 
beyond. The Sumac this year is not in 
beauty — not as if a sunset cloud had settled 
down upon it. The multitude of new green 
shoots would seem to overpower the crim- 
soned fluff. 




AUGUST. 



The Garden is a mute Gospel. 
The Garden is a perpetual Gala, 




XI. 
AUGUST. 

'•Aly Sunflower" — Of a Garden Sunday — Of Ghosts in 
the twilight — Magnolia Grandiflora. 

August 6. — The Lime avenue is pleasanter 
than ever now, on these bright afternoons 
when the low sun strikes amber shafts 
through the branches, and light shadows lie 
on the parquet of brown and yellow leaves 
beneath. With every breeze hundre^ds of 
the winged seed-vessels, like queer little 
teetotums, come twirling down. The wrens 
are busy with their second or third nests — 
without counting the cock-nests at the begin- 
ning of the season ; the porch swallows are 
thinking of a second brood, and scatter straws 
of hay and patches of wet mud untidily upon 



74 



DAYS AND HOURS 



the stones underneath their nests ; thrushes 
go about the lawn followed by two or three 
great awkward young ones (their third family 
this season), too foolish to pick up worms for 
themselves. As for the sparrows, they are 
hard at work w^ith probably the sixth or 
seventh nest of their series. Roses are coming 
on in their second bloom ; low bushes and 
standards of La France show large buds and 
attar-scented blossoms ; while crimson Roses 
of many names, glow in richest bloom here 
and there all over the garden. Precious as 
are these late Roses, the chord of colour has 
changed so much since Roses were in their 
prime, that fresh pink or crimson seem 
almost misplaced among the fiery reds and 
scarlet. White Roses are seldom so beauti- 
ful as one feels they ought to be ; but a 
small plant of the Japanese Rosa rugosa in 
its first season witii us, has been a great pet 
this summer, wath its large white petals ; the 
Macartney also is welcome, flowering as it 
has for the first time in its life here. The 
buds have hitherto always fallen off, without 
an attempt at unclosing, and it has only kept 
its place on the wall for the sake of the 



IN A GARDEN. 



ns 



lovely evergreen leaves and yearly promise 
of abundant bloom. But the only perfect 
white Rose, the White Moss, remains still 
for me a dream and nothing more. There 
are tall old bluish pink Roses at the back 
of the Beechen close which have been 
blooming in almost rank luxuriance. They, 
with a few Cabbage Roses and Maiden's 
Blush, and a yellow Banksia, were all of 
Roses the garden had when first we came 
here eleven years ago. At that time they 
were thought too ugly almost to live, and 
were banished to the outskirts. But time 
has brought them round to the front again ; 
and now these relics of a bygone Rose age, 
are beloved for their redundant and per- 
fum^ed bloom, and for their most uncommon 
colour, the red in them being so largely mixed 
with cold blue. The York and Lancaster 
Rose — long lost and long-coveted — will, I 
hope, ere next season be established with 
us. For the other day in Somersetshire we 
found one growing near a ghostly house in 
a deserted garden, and from this plant we 
have some healthy suckers. I cannot keep 
pace with the new Roses ; they are mostly 



176 DAYS AND HOURS 

too large and heavy. They seem to run too 
far from the flatness of a really typical Rose 
type. 

We have not made potpourri this summer ; 
but the Lavender harvest is gathered in, 
with spikes unusually fine. I am not sure 
that they smell much the sweeter for their 
great size. It is a pleasant time when the 
Lavender is laid out in trays, and the house 
is full of the sweetness of it. On these 
bright windy mornings the Broad Walk looks 
its best. Looking up from south to north, 
the end of the walk framed in with trees, is 
bounded by a low quickset hedge beyond 
which lies meadow-land with glimpses of 
yellow cornfields. Beyond all is the soft 
blue of distant wood. Along the Yew hedge 
on one side, are long borders in the turf 
of single Dahlias in succession to Sweet- 
williams (Bearded pink) : and the other side 
under the wall is enriched with scarlet ; 
the scarlet of those tall Lychnis which the 
children call " summer lightning " (^Lychnis 
chalcedonia, flower of Bristow and Constan- 
tinople.) And there are sheafs of finely 
dyed rose-red Phloxes, pyramids of blue 



I A' A GARDEN. ijj 

and white Campanula, and clumps of dark 
blue Salvia ; — grey and feathery Gypsophila 
paniculata also, — priceless for the setting 
off of delicate Poppies, and other refined 
and frail kinds when cut. Yet the mass 
of colour would be far more brilliant but 
for the bulbs which lie hidden under the 
earth. They must not be disturbed by 
planting in amongst them, so all that is in 
the border has its place there perennially. 

Spaces in the wall behind — where the 
ancient Pear trees may have perished from 
old age — are sometimes dressed in spread- 
ing Vines. Last month, a tall blue Lark- 
spur, near one of these vines, was caught by 
the wandering tendrils, and so they grew 
together, the Larkspur upheld by her friend 
the Vine with a strong and tender grasp. 
Green streamers of this Vine also wreathe 
the head of an iron gate empurpled with 
intermingling Clematis. Here also close 
to the old wall at regular intervals, are 
our Sunflowers — some of them grow to 
nearly ten feet in height. After many trials 
of other spots, we think they seem to do 
best planted thus. The shelter saves them 

12 



lyS BAYS AND HOURS 

all conflict with wind and rain, and they 
are tall and straight and full, having no 
cares of weather to divert their gradual 
growth to beauty. There was a time when 
I did not love sunflowers. Their constant 
repetition as a kind of aesthetic badge, can 
scarcely fail to tire. In those days they 
had no place in the garden, or only in some 
out-of-the-way obscure corner. But once 
I found a little song of William Blake's, and 
ever since for the music of it the Sunflower 
has been beloved, with the feeling that to 
know her is to give her your heart. 

" Ah, Sunflower ! weary of time. 

Who countest the steps of the sun ; 
Seeking after that sweet golden prime 

Where the traveller's journey is done ; 
Where the youth pined away with desire, 

And the pale virgin shrouded in snow, 
Arise from their graves and aspire 

Where my Sunflower wishes to go." 

Perhaps there is not much of common sense 
in the words ! but they surely are most 
musical. How grand these Sunflowers are ! 
and there is a sweet and gracious look in the 
Sunflower's open face. With all her grand 



IN A GARDEN. 179 

mien and stately stature, she never stares up 
direct at her god ; the golden head half 
bends down — downward also point the 
symmetrically set broad leaves, delicately 
shaped cii cceur. The whole aspect is one of 
contemplation, or at least one fancies it to 
be so. There is also a sort of majesty in the 
one strong single stem from which proceeds 
so fine a show of buds, and flowers, and 
leaves. Yet I have never been happy enough 
to see her act the part of the poet's sun- 
flower — the real Sunflower of our earthly gar- 
dens could never turn her head so fast ; all 
that I know she does is to bloom on which- 
ever side of her the sun arises. Poets, never- 
theless, are the true seers, and without 
doubt they know what they say. The 
French name "Tournesol," would seem to 
imply a popular belief that the flower 
follows the sun. 

The silly Dahlia would turn her face to 
the wall or any way. Brilliant as are these 
single Dahlias, they are rather trying in their 
ways ; so much rank leaf and stalk and so 
little flower. The plants sometimes too 
large and bushy, sometimes too thin ; and 



l8o DAYS AND HOURS 



then it is so irritating when their backs are 
turned as one passes along the walk ! The 
so-called Cactus Dahlia is not at all tire- 
some ; it is beautiful both in form and 

colour. 

August 26. Sunday Moiming. — After a 
hundred years, if the Seven Sleepers awoke 
on an English Sunday morning they would 
certainly at once know what day it was. 
There is nothing else like it for the feeling 
of intense repose. No other stillness can 
compare with the deep calm of a Sunday 
morning such as this. No leaf stirs, there 
is no cloud moving above in the hot hazy 
blue ; the clatter of the iron road has ceased, 
the very birds are still. Swallows alone are 
ever on the wing, and the silence is so 
profound that the beat of their wings can be 
heard as they dart by in rapid course. The 
busy cornfields lie empty in a golden rest. 
Only here and there, where the harvest is 
not yet gathered in, the sheaves, like praying 
hands, stand together on the field. In the 
green pastures the grazing cattle seem to 
tread with hushed and silent step. And 



IN A GARDEN. 



I8l 



there is a sound of church bells on the air 
coming clear yet faint across the level 
country. There will be no church for the 
tired harvestmen whom we saw yesterday 
lying on the dusty grass by the roadside. 
They are too tired and too ragged and dirty ; 
but we may hope for them also some rest- 
ful influences from the quiet of the day, 
under such a blue sky. 

The early morning is always the time of 
all others for the garden, while the flowers 
are refreshed with the dew and darkness 
and cool of night, and are rejoicing yet in 
the light of a new sun. Soon they will 
begin to flag in the dry weary round of 
burning hours. To one who only knows the 
garden after eight o'clock a.m., a walk round 
it between seven and eight or earlier, would 
be a revelation. On this special morning the 
flowers in the east border seem penetrated 
through and through with the rapture of 
existence. Each Sunflower stands with half 
transparent shadow sharp-cut upon the wall 
behind it; its petals fresh gilt, its centre 
sparkling with dew. Rose-red Phlox and 
flaming Sword Lilies (Corn-flag), blue Salvia 



1 82 DAYS AND HOURS 

intermixed with many-coloured stars of 
Dahlias, and an indescribable mob of smaller, 
more insignificant things. Round the corner 
a great mass of common white Clematis fills 
the air with fragrance. It is all whiteness and 
sweetness — it is a summer cloud — a white 
cumulus of surpassing beauty. One of the 
stone vases of the gate pillars is completely 
hidden under the white foam. But this 
matters not ; nothing matters but that we 
should have the Clematis there in its loveli- 
ness ! The Tigridias in the entrance court 
are wide open, and none would guess how 
brief their hours were to be. There are a few 
perfect Roses — morning glories (Convolvulus 
Major), and orange Tropceolums ('* Lark- 
heels trim") with bluish leaves. The dew lies 
upon all, and one may say in the garden the 
Psalmist's words about the valleys thick with 
corn, for the flowers all seem to laugh and 
sing with joy. Ten glorious days of almost 
uninterrupted sunshine have made us very 
dry. Daily waterings help to keep things 
alive, but the grass is a little brown in some 
parts of the lawns, and there are yellow leaves 
on the Elms and the older Laburnums. 



IN A GARDEN. 183 

The dead dry leaves rustle so thick under 
foot in the Lime avenue, that one looks up 
to see if any green is left. 

Most of the German seed grasses are 
already gathered, though a few have still to 
ripen. We always sow a good variety, they 
look so fresh while growing and afterwards 
are dried for the winter. There is the 
pretty Tussock-grass with soft downy tufts, 
and the long feathery kind, like waving hair ; 
and one most delicate and spray-like, is a 
sort of miniature Bulrush with a green 
curved head ; and then there is a little 
forest of our English Bashaw grass [Bromiis 
Aspen). This is very handsome and gigantic 
in size, and came up of itself in one of the 
wild bits of the garden. The handsomest 
of all our grasses this year, is a fine blue 
grass (Lyme Grass, Elymus Arenarius)^ from 
the dunes of Holland. The colour amongst 
other greens is absolutely blue. It grows 
so strong, and the leaves so long, that it 
might almost be mistaken for an Iris. It 
is strange that this grass should thrive ap- 
parently as well, or better, in a Buckingham- 
shire srarden, than in its native sands ! Near 



184 DAYS AND HOURS 

the old Syringa {^Philadelphus)^ on the turf at 
the greenhouse door, two large pots of white 
Campanula are stood out for change of air. 
They are so tall that as one passes by in the 
gloaming, one is startled by these tall white 
persons suddenly appearing out of the dusk. 
Others of the same pyramidal Campanulas 
remain in the house. They are pale pinkish 
blue and white. Hundreds of blossoms 
cover up and hide the whole plant, and 
nothing is seen but the mass of wide open 
flowerets. So cleverly are the flowers 
arranged, there is no sign of over-crowding 
— and one asks how this is, for they seem 
to be set quite close and even. **To ques- 
tions such as these, Nature answers, I grow." 
The Auratum Lilies had vainly promised to 
open for so long that I almost lost patience. 
The dry weather may have caused them to 
delay. Constant watering seems now to 
have begun to take effect, and there are 
two or three superb blooms. The bulbs 
are not taken up for the autumn ; they are 
only covered over with fine ashes or cocoa- 
nut fibre. If a plant will consent to live in 
its own place winter and summer, it seems 



AV A GARDEN. 185 



SO much more real somehow. I wished to 
try the plan with our Spanish irises, but 
in their case it proved a complete failure. 
Our large roots of Salvia patens are seven 
years old : they are yearly cut down and 
covered with ashes. 

The parterr is at this time in its full per- 
fection. In other gardens I observe the blue 
Lobelia has done flowering, but our seedling 
that we raised, with bronze foliage, is as 
fine as it was t\A'o months ago, I cannot 
say the blue is so cool as the others, but the 
staying power of this special kind is of real 
importance, and the beds are most luminous. 
I am greatly enjoying a beautiful large blue 
Agapanthus in a green tub, placed on the 
grass near a trimmed Box tree, with a black 
Irish Yew for background. The scarlet 
Pelargoniums (must that long name be 
always said ?) glow so hotly, they seem to 
want as much blue and green as we can give 
them. Never has our Magnolia grandiflora 
flowered so well ; I have counted nine great 
blossoms on the two trees at the same time. 
The texture of no other flower comes near 
to the beauty of the Magnolia. I remember 



1 86 DAYS AND HOURS IN A GARDEN. 

long ago a white chested beautiful boy, whose 
mother called him in play her Magnolia boy. 
That little child was the only flower I ever 
savv' that could compare with the Magnolia ! 




SEPTEMBER. 



" Time will run back to fetch the 
age of gold." 

Milton. 

^^ In graceful stucession^ in equal fuhiess, in balanced 
beatify^ the dance of the hours goes forivard still. " 

Emerson. 




XII. 
SEPTEMBER. 

Of Psyche — Of an Old Garden — Nil Desperanduui — 
Of Branches bearing Beauteous Fruit. 

September i"]. — That is not to-day! Time 
has since been sliding on faster and further 
away from summer into autumn. Yet I 
have a fancy to mark the date of as sweet 
a September day as ever shone upon this 
garden. I believe the people who got 
most enjoyment out of the sunshine of that 
marvellous day, were the butterflies. There 
was a real butterflies' ball held in the long 
border of single Dahlias ! An hour before 
noon the flowers, beautiful in all the bril- 
liance of their rainbow dyes, were visited 
by a dancing throng of Atalanta butterflies. 



190 DAYS AND HOURS 

Yellow, red, orange, lilac, white — every 
flower had its Atalanta or two. They were 
the finest butterflies of the kind I ever saw. 
Strong on the wing, and faultless in the 
perfection of their white-edged black velvet 
and scarlet suits, they were the very embodi- 
ment of joyousness. Not a jot did they care 
in their pride and joy of life, though a 
hundred deaths surrounded them. They 
knew nothing at all about that indeed. Life 
in the'' balmy air with the sunshine and the 
flowers was all in all to them. A few shabby 
Gamma moths, and hosts of humble bees 
combining business with amusement, mixed 
in with the butterflies. By noon the whole 
gay company dispersed. Later in the day 
I found those fickle Atalantas disporting 
themselves upon some yellow everlastings 
in another part of the garden. Butterfly 
life varies in our garden year by year, but I 
never saw so many Atalantas. This summer 
we have seen few Peacocks or Tortoise- 
shells. Orange-tips (Euchloe cardamines) 
were unusually plentiful in the spring, as were 
also our White Cabbages throughout the 
summer. So much fair weather as there has 



IN A GARDEN. 191 



been required a good supply ! since two 
white butterflies in the morning are the sure 
sign of a fine day — and this summer they 
had always to be about in pairs. Often, 
a large brimstone has floated calmly by. 
The chalkhill blue (Polyommatus Corydon), 
for many past seasons noted as appear- 
ing about the Yew hedges in March, has 
failed us this year ; there have been no 
humming-bird sphinxes, and the far-scented 
Auratum Lilies, where often on warm even- 
ings I have sought great Hawkmoths, seem 
to have attracted nothing but scores of very 
inferior looking Gammas. It is an intense 
pleasure to watch these various most beauti- 
ful beings in all the freedom of their way- 
ward wildness. No inducement would to 
me seem powerful enough, — now that the 
barbarity of youth is past — to cause their 
capture and death, were they never so rare 
as specimens. 

And now the rain and the falling leaves 
recall but too vividly the true date (Sept. 28), 
reminding me that I have to tell of the gar- 
den's autumnal desolation, — yet if the days 
would only keep fair and bright, enough still 



192 



DAYS AND HOURS 



is left there to make one happy. The single 
Dahlias have won their way quite since last 
I wrote, and now I love them dearly. 1 hey 
are alone sufficient to light up half the 
garden. Our chief border is made up of 
seedlings, an exquisite variety of colours, 
mauve or rose-lilac coming least often, — 
and a yellow with reddened or burnt-sienna 
tipped petals, by far the loveliest. Named 
varieties are along with the Sunflowers 
opposite. White Queen I like the best — 
such large pure flowers. A White Queen 
with an Atalanta butterfly settling on it 
is a perfect little bit of contrasted colour. 
I am schooling myself to say Dah-lia, but 
habit is strong, and Daylia will persist in 
coming out. In Curtis' s Botanical Magazine 
of 1803, vol. xix., p. 762, " Dahlia coccinea, 
scarlet flowered Dahlia," is figured. There 
is a note — '' so named in honour of Andrew 
Dahl, a Swedish botanist . . . not to be 
confounded with Dalea, a plant named after 
Dale, the friend of Ray." The pronunciation 
settled, the Magazine goes on to say the 
Dahlia is '* a native of South America, and 
may be considered as a hardy greenhouse 



IN A GARDEN. 1 93 

herbaceous perennial." These beautiful 
flowers are especially valuable since rain has 
no effect on them, though rough winds so 
easily break the brittle stems. The double 
Dahlia is unknown in our garden : it has 
never been admitted. Fine as it is in form 
and colour, the dislike to it seems perhaps 
unreasonable, yet through some far-off asso- 
ciation I can never disconnect the double 
Dahlia from a sort of mixture of earwigs 
and pen- wipers ! The clumps of Japanese 
Anemones both white and rosy-grey, are 
always full of an unfailing charm. We try 
to prolong their existence by snipping off 
the round seed-heads. One might as easily 
make ropes of sand. . . . The same service 
done to Dahlias is just within human possi- 
bility. The dark red-mauve variety shows 
an individuality which gives it great value in 
the autumn borders. The irregularly-shaped 
flowers, whose narrow petals manifest an 
inclination to double, last longer than those 
of the other two kinds. Rain and wind have 
destroyed the beauty of Salvia patens ; it 
will bloom out again, however. The rich 
blue of this well-loved Salvia, contrasts well 

13 



194 DAYS AND HOURS 

with white Anemones when mixed in the 
flower-glasses. As for cut flowers, they are 
always a doubtful pleasure. I gather them 
with a pang, and would rather enjoy them 
blooming their full time out in the garden. 
And yet what other ornament is there — even 
of finest porcelain — to compare with fresh- 
cut flowers .-' Nor are pictures, nor rich 
satins of Italy, sufficient without flowers to 
make your room look bright and habitable. 
Even that best decoration — walls well lined 
with books — is the better for a few flowers 
on the table. So that I am not yet prepared 
to follow the example of the old lady who 
never allowed one flower in her garden to 
be cut, and filled her glasses with artificial 
Roses ! Sunflowers are sprouting round 
their strong stems, and surrounded thus by 
constellations of smaller suns are perhaps 
even handsomer than before. We have two 
curiosities of Sunflower at this moment — 
curious as demonstrating a resolve to exist 
and flower under any circumstances what- 
ever. One is a large thick-stemmed plant, 
which must have met at some time with 
some violent discouragement ; it lies curled 



IN A GARDEN. 195 



round flat on the earth, looking almost like 
a poor starved cat with a large head ; for, 
though quite overgrown with summer 
Phloxes and Roses, etc., one large flower at 
the end of its stalk tries to look up, while 
two or three of smaller size growing along 
the stalk do the same. In contrast to the 
deformity below it, a miniature Sunflower 
slenderly graceful, with blossom no larger 
than a florin, springs out of the mortar 
between two bricks high up on the wall. 
There is no visible crevice, but some tiny 
nail-hole there must be where somehow a 
seed had lodged. 

Though many borders have now begun to 
look forlorn, we feel the garden has done 
well. It is still quite full of flowers ; in 
some parts gay even, as it could never have 
been with the dulness of the most brilliant 
" bedding out." The entrance court is bright 
with Nicotiana, scarlet Pelargoniums, Zinnias, 
double white Petunia, and blue Lobelias. 
The long desired pink China Roses, intended 
for these beds once, could not be found any- 
where. Such simple loveliness is out of 
fashion it seems ! Torch plants (Tritoma) 



196 DAYS AND HOURS 

are alight in all the edges of distant shrub- 
beries. There are Japan Anemones and 
CEnothera everywhere. The Sweet Pea 
hedge by the tennis-court is out again in 
bloom. Marigolds take care of themselves. 
They keep going off and coming on again, 
shining out in the dark where least expected. 
Our Marigolds are the deepest orange-gold. 
The seed was brought from Cannes, where 
their colour is always so fine. They 
incline to turn pale with us, so we have 
to weed out pale faces in order to keep the 
stock black-eyed and fiery. Golden rod is 
plentiful and useful, and I like it for the 
sake of old remembrance. Eighty years ago 
as I used to hear, the Gardens at Hampton 
Court knew no other flowers at all. '^* The 
great square beds were simply filled with 
Golden Rod. Those must have been happier 
days at Hampton Court before carpet bed- 
ding was known — when the Yews were 
in all their beauty, and the fountain sent up 

* In the royal Private Gardens, however, at Hampton 
Court, rare plants were cultivated so far back as 1691 j 
such as the Green-flowered Knowltonia Vesicatoria, 
etc. 



IN A GARDEN. 1 97 

its single lofty jet, and children played upon 
the mimic harp wrought in the beautiful iron 
gate of the Pavilion Walk, or peeped through 
the bars at the browsing deer. 

Amongst what may be called the ruck of 
flowers throughout the garden, are deep 
crimson Snapdragon, Zinnias, of all shades 
of colour; Verbenas pink, white, red, and 
striped purple ; low Phloxes flesh-coloured 
and crimson — more beautiful than they 
ever were in their proper season ; Musk, 
Michaelmas Daisies, Euphea platycentra, 
Mignonette, Lobelias — the bronzed-leaved 
Lobelia Cardinalis ; lilac and white and pink 
Everlastings, white Marguerites and red 
Pyrethrums, Princes' Feather, yellow Hearts- 
ease, and Mrs. Sinkins Pink in a grand 
dash of second bloom — an endless variety 
all making the effort to put forth their best, 
now that the last times draw so near. We 
might gather baskets of flowers and fill the 
house with them, were we so minded, and 
still hardly miss them from the garden. 
And yet has it not been said, '* Bright tints 
that shine, are but a sign that summer's 
past" ? And full well I know the garden's 



igS DAYS AND HOURS 

pleasure, is even now growing towards 
the end. Roses, it need scarcely be said, 
abound ; even Charles Lawson is red with 
a second bloom. A few Damask Roses are 
coming out by mistake. They look very 
strange, putting one in mind of a long for- 
gotten Rose, the Rose des Quatre Saisons. 
I see it clearly now, as I knew it in other 
days — pink all over with its October blos- 
soming — in a garden whose loveliness lives 
only in the past — " Quarter Sessions " Rose, 
the ancient guardian of the place not un- 
naturally used to say ! Shall I try to paint 
that garden ? for surely none such exist any 
more. It was like Shelley's poem of the 
Sensitive Plant, full of the poetry of trees 
and grass and flowers. ... A nearly level 
space cut in the depths of a hanging wood ; 
no enclosing boundary to be seen, save here 
and there between the Rhododendrons hints 
of a mossy low stone wall, or the Sweet 
Briar hedge at one end fencing off a stretch 
of Cedarn turf. On the upper edge of the 
gently sloping lawn a grand old Beech tree 
with silvered bole caught the rays of the 
morning sun. There was a giant Larch all 



IN A GARDEN. 



99 



bearded with long grey lichens ; a Tulip tree, 
a standard Magnolia. Here also was the 
orangery ; up its columns were twined 
trumpet Honey-suckles and Passion-flowers. 
In front, a sunny plot — oblong beds, with 
narrow walks between — was devoted to 
Carnations, Ranunculus, and many choicest 
favourites. A walk wound round the lawn, 
and upon the smooth grass were beds full of 
lovely old-fashioned flowers. Large tree- 
Roses, yellow Briars and Scotch Roses (white 
and red), and the old Queen of Sweden, and 
tall poles covered with climbing Roses,loose- 
petaled and cherry-coloured — Noisettes, 
and Souvenir de IMalmaison grew also on 
the turf, — with arches of Honeysuckle, and 
thickets of incense-breathing Spice plants. 
On the lower shady side, the walk went 
on betvv^een bosquets of Kalmia and Azalea. 
Here also great heaped-up limestone rock 
formed a sort of natural wall between 
the garden and the wood. Every cranny 
was filled with rare and delicate Ferns and 
all shade-loving Alpine plants, while double 
white and blue Periwinkles streamed down 
everywhere. Alpine Roses, too, flourished 



200 DAYS AND HOURS 

here luxuriantly. On the lower side at one 
corner, a vista was cut through the trees, 
so that over the Rhododendrons, — here 
kept quite low, — one looked through a frame 
of Beeches far away across the wide sunlit 
valley, across the corn and pastures, hedge- 
rows, coppice and farm roofs, — to the long 
range of wooded hills, and the grey tower 
cresting the distant headland. A little wire 
gate hid behind the rocks, gave access to 
the garden from the house by a narrow path- 
way in the wood. I never knew that garden 
in its prime. When I remember it the 
sweetest flowers grew amid long weeds and 
grasses, and it had all the wild grace of a 
deserted garden ; for those who loved it were 
gone, and the old gardener could scarce 
hobble round to tend his " Quarter Sessions " 
Roses ; and now he too is long dead, and 
the place is — modernised. . . . 

The '* Fantaisie " has been an unfrequented 
spot of late. It is a wilderness of flower 
and seeding plants, somewhat damp and 
overgrown. '* The Forest " will have to be 
remodelled, and we contemplate an annexe 
on the north side. Such rapid growth is 



IN A GARDEN. 



made that soon the character of both garden 
and " Fantaisie " must wholly change. The 
larger trees are fast losing that look of 
smiling youth which so enchants us in young 
newly planted wood. Each little tree is 
growing tall, and each begins to spread itself 
in uncompromising isolation. Evergreens 
encroach more and more upon the borders, 
crowding out the flowers and crowding each 
other so as to render necessary many a 
painful sacrifice. Twelve months ago signs 
of the coming change were hardly visible. 
Since regret is unavailing, new plans must 
be laid to draw new pleasures from the 
inevitable. I note with some pride that the 
experiment of beheading Cryptomeria elegans 
succeeds so far, that in every instance the 
trees bush out healthily, instead of running 
up into brown raggedness. 

As I write, near the library window, a 
dim glory seems to be stealing round. The 
light from a stormy sunset has fired the 
Virginian Creeper and the Apples on a large 
tree beyond the stone ball at the corner 
of the wall. The leaves glow blood-red, and 
the fruit shines like molten ore. The tree 



202 DAYS AND HOURS 

is decaying with a huge brown fungus 
feeding on its heart. It is so old that a 
Virginian Creeper was planted to grow up 
the gaunt trunk, and Mistletoe is left to flou- 
rish over all the branches as it lists. Yet in a 
good Apple year, the fruit still clusters from 
the top of the tree down almost to the 
ground. And growing on its green lawn 
thus, one dreams a passing dream of the 
Apples of the Hesperides — and the red Vir- 
ginian climber is the great fiery scaled 
dragon gliding up through the leaves to 
gaze with dull eye seawards. But there are 
no maidens dancing in a ring, and I have 
just seen three hungry thrushes attack the 
Apples unforbidden. 

Nothing is so uncertain as Pears. There 
has been a first-rate lot on a young Flemish 
Beauty, growing against the gardener's 
cottage. They have been gathered earlier 
than usual, which may be the reason why they 
surpass in flavour and juiciness those of last 
year. Williams' Bon Chretien, always good, 
is this year somewhat impaired in outward 
appearance by black dots all over the fruit. 
Can these dots be caused by the asfe of the 



IN A GARDEN, 2 03 



trees ? In one half of the Vine-houses long 
bunches of white Muscats are hanging still. 
They are crisp and finely flavoured, and show 
well against a purple background of Madres- 
field Court. Next season we hope for a 
crop of Frontignacs, to satisfy the wish for 
old-fashioned thin-skinned Grapes. Round 
the windows the Vines are yellowing, with 
green fruit ripening fast. These are un- 
usually sweet for outdoor Grapes, and have 
yielded a fair wine in their time. Large 
green Apples (Reinette du Canada) in the 
walled garden, are nearly as beautiful as 
the trees of Blenheim Orange, which are 
reddening in the orchard. 

Very pleasant and Arcadian in the mellow 
autumn sunshine are these days of Apple 
gathering ! There is no undue haste ; the 
man on the ladder up in the tree leisurely 
fills his basket. Baskets, half full of fruit, 
stand near upon the leaf-strewn grass. 
Children are sure to gather round, and 
there is an odour of ripe Apples upon the 
air. After an indecision of some years' 
duration I have at last arranged my 
September bill of fare — in Arcadia ! Grapes 



204 ^-4F5 AND HOURS IX A GARDEN. 

and Pears to look at, Nectarines and "the 
curious Peach " to smell, fresh Figs to feed 
on in the morning, Golden Drop Plums all 
day long ! 

But, ah ! there has chanced just now a 
golden drop of quite another kind. The last 
gold sand has fallen of the last hour of these 
dear garden days, and only one more word 
must be said — Farewell ! 




^C?4 



891 




















"^o 













^o v^ : 











'^^r^• 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper proce 
^' Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: May 2009 

. ^ PreservationTechnologie 

k* A WORLD LEADER IM COLLFHTinMS PRFSFRUiT 
















HECKMAN 

BINDERY INC. 

.^^ JAN 89 



